


Once in a Lifetime

by lettersfromnowhere



Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, F/M, Gen, Taang as Sui/Han bc I Said So, Zuko and Katara as Ice Dance Partners, figure skating AU
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-10-05
Updated: 2021-02-21
Packaged: 2021-03-07 18:21:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 15
Words: 81,748
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26832097
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lettersfromnowhere/pseuds/lettersfromnowhere
Summary: Katara's not sure if she'll ever be able to return to the sport she loves after a devastating injury and a disastrous end to her longtime ice dance partnership. Zuko's not sure hewantsto, but fate - and a famed ice dance coach - have other plans.And with four years and four seasons to build up the partnership neither even wanted, these unlikeliest of allies find themselves fighting for more than just their Olympic dreams.
Relationships: Katara/Zuko (Avatar), Minor or Background Relationship(s)
Comments: 230
Kudos: 178





	1. The Stories That Matter

**Author's Note:**

> Welcome to the nichest Zutara AU you're ever going to read, courtesy of your local ice dance stan/former competitive figure skater with way too much time on her hands. 
> 
> Enter if you dare. :)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, so for those of you who don't know, Ice Dance is a discipline of figure skating based on ballroom dance. There are no jumps. If you want to get acquainted with what this looks like, here is an excellent example: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eHM_Nx_vgBQ
> 
> Ice Dance competitions are divided into two segments: a Short Dance (just under three minutes), which is based on a specific pattern dance that changes yearly - a tango, a waltz, etc. - and has very specific requirements for music and choreography, and a Free Dance (four minutes), which can be anything. Points are awarded based on Levels, which essentially determine how well you completed your required technical elements. 
> 
> In this story, the pattern during Katara and Zuko's first season is a Finnstep, which I chose because it's my favorite, and here is an example of what that looks like: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LrHfkgp5-xM [I'm aware that this is the same team as the above video...I just liked the breakdown of the pattern in this video.]
> 
> Though I haven't figured out their SD music in detail because the requirements are a headache to work around, I DO know that at least one of the pieces they use is this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Le8a7u1pANU  
> And their FD music is this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d10_sLHZNhA  
> [Katara's dress is based upon the one the character is wearing in this screencap.]
> 
> That insane amount of information about ice dance having been exposited upon, please enjoy! I was a figure skater for many years and I absolutely love the sport so this was a bit of a passion project for me, and I hope you love it as much as I loved writing it. <3

**_April_ **

**_Caldera Cricket Club_ **

****

The stories that matter never start this way.

The stories that matter all sound the same. A little girl needed a partner and a little boy was lured into skating with her before he was old enough to regret the loss of his quadruple-jump dreams. The little boy and girl traded jumps and spins for rockers and counters and patterns, athleticism they could understand even in their youth for artistry they couldn’t. They learned to dance together and they never stopped. They rose through the ranks, scrappy teenagers chasing every spare point, and then they arrived. They won medals and accolades and fans, and the lucky ones won each other’s hearts.

The stories that matter sound like that, and they certainly don’t start with a skeptical college girl’s small hand in that of an apathetic twentysomething. They don’t start this late. The stories that matter start young, when animosity hasn’t learned to choke out the potential for partnership yet. The stories that matter speak of willingness and chemistry and some little spark that cannot be manufactured.

They don’t speak of a girl whose former partner’s carelessness shot her Olympic dreams in cold blood, nor of a boy who’s too haunted by the past to be worried about the scores that flash across the screen as he sits in the Kiss-and-Cry beside a partner who could be anyone, for all he cares.

They’ve heard the stories, the legacies left before them. They are ice dancers; they cannot _not_ know who walked this path before they did, leaving behind footprints that two people who do not want to skate together could probably never fill. They’ve heard it all. Her mother talked endlessly of Torvill and Dean and Bolero; his uncle possessed an abiding love of the Russian dance teams of the nineteen-nineties in all their garish glory: Mishkutenok and Dimitriev, Grishuk And Platov, Usova and Zhulin. They know the stories, the names, the way they all begin and end.

They certainly do not think that Nishimura and Nutaraq will ever belong to that pantheon of near-household names, for their story is all wrong. It cannot matter.

And yet, Zuko Nishimura thinks with something that feels traitorously close to hope, Katara Nutaraq’s gloved hand sets perfectly against his shoulder as they skate in hold.

It’s a Killian, the basic place to start, his hand at her waist and hers on his shoulder, and her carriage is impeccable; his own straightens in response. No girl has ever taken the much-maligned slump out of his shoulders, but he can’t exactly keep on slouching when the girl he dislikes almost as much as he wants to impress her skates in his arms with her spine as straight as a soldier with the effortless airiness of a prima at the Bolshoi.

That alone makes him wonder if this time will be different – maybe even different enough to _matter._

He’s burned through four girls on a conveyer belt of partners who cannot take the heat of his temper in three years. He wonders if this one is any different, _why_ Iroh had insisted that she would be when every girl he skates with takes off for greener pastures.

The stories that matter speak of struggle, but never division, never the inadequacy of being unable to hold down a partner.

She’s barely been able to bring herself step back out on the ice since that night last November. She remembers the pain – how could she not? – but that isn’t what keeps her away. No, pain could never take the thing she loves most from her. But betrayal could, and she feels it fresh every time she slips off her skate guards and steps onto the ice. She hears meaningless promises and feels her body slam the ice and remembers the world going dark before she awoke to find that nothing was right anymore. She remembers and she cannot move, cannot do the thing she swore she would never give up. And though the simple waltz they skate is easy as breathing, part of her still wants to freeze at the mere idea of beginning anew when all she wants to forget.

She does not know, nor is she sure if she wants to know, why she bothered with this partner when she cannot trust that he will be any different than the last.

The stories that matter speak of heartbreak, but never of betrayal, never of the road to recovery and the partner who would not stay. 

By all means, Katara Nutaraq and Zuko Nishimura should be names lost to history. They have none of the Specialness which makes one great, after all, and meet none of the benchmarks. They know and believe it.

But they skate over to a beaming Iroh, dropping each other’s hands and not meeting each other’s eyes, and there is something in them that Zuko has not seen in quite some time. As he pats them on the back and tells them that they’ll make a wonderful match, there is _conviction_ in his eyes.

Conviction, perhaps, that he is witnessing the opening line of a story that matters.

* * *

**_May_ **

She shows up before the rink’s doors have even been unlocked.

  
It’s one of the first things Zuko notices about Katara: by the time he arrives at five-fifteen sharp, exactly when the doors are unlocked for the six A.M. practice session, Katara has, invariably, already been there for…he doesn’t even know how long. Sometimes she’s jumping rope in her running shoes and legwarmers, warming up in the pitch-dark of the morning as if there’s nothing strange at all about it. Others she’s sitting on top of the suitcase she carries her skates in, scrolling aimlessly through her phone and shivering in the early-morning chill.

He’s always fancied himself an early riser, but he still cannot fathom what motivates her to drag herself to the rink so much earlier than she needs to. It’s almost fascinating, this unwavering commitment to something that could not be less consequential, and though they’re not exactly friends – they do not hate each other, but they are not particularly interested in each other, either – he can’t help but ask.

So on a dim May morning during the third week of their practices together, he persuades Iroh to leave fifteen minutes earlier than they normally would. Iroh raises his eyebrows and Zuko wishes for the eightieth time that week that he could afford not to carpool with his uncle; he isn’t looking forward to the thousands of follow-up questions that he’s inevitably going to ask in the car. (Doubtless he’ll assume there’s a reason for Zuko’s vested interest in his partner beyond mere curiosity; there is not.)

But Zuko thinks himself the curious type, and it is worth it.

By the time they arrive, it is just after five, and Katara is jogging in place next to the bike rack just outside doors, probably trying to keep herself warm. She cuts an odd figure in the glow of their headlights as Iroh’s minivan pulls into the parking lot, running in place in nude tights and a gauzy blue wraparound skirt over electric-blue jogging shoes, her wavy hair bouncing against the back of her red and white Team Canada jacket in its ponytail. She looks up at their approaching car and smiles, because she adores her new coach even though she’s taking a little longer to warm up to her partner, with a little wave.

To put it uncharitably, she looks ridiculous.

To put it charitably, though Zuko isn’t inclined to do so, she looks like something he had never known he needed to see until he did.

Zuko doesn’t say anything when he makes his way over to her, dragging a black enamel suitcase. He leans against the bike rack, watching his partner intently, and waits for her to speak first.

“Hi, Zuko,” she finally says after fifteen awkward seconds of silence punctuated only by the sound of her shoes slapping the concrete.

“Hi, Katara,” he replies, feeling for all the world like he did on his first day of seventh grade. It isn’t a feeling he’s missed, and he’s eager to fill the silence. “You’re early.”

She stops running and crosses her arms, though it’s not a hostile gesture. “I’m _always_ early. It’s _you_ being early that’s unusual.” She narrows her eyes, sizing him up. “So…why?” 

“Why am I early?” Zuko would rather die than admit he’s here because of her and he scrambles for a convincing lie. “Um…I, uh. Uncle…” he knows Iroh would never mind being used as an excuse. “Uncle…needed to do…a thing. Early. So we’re…early.”

Katara laughs, shaking her head fondly, and the lights that flick on overhead illuminate her hair as it swishes with her every movement. “I’m not going to bite, you know,” she says gently.

He wishes he could disappear beneath the surface of the earth and keep falling until he hit its molten core, because the only thing worse than an awkward silence is an awkward silence that is acknowledged.

“I know,” Zuko says apologetically, unable to meet her eyes. “Sorry.”

“No, it’s okay.” Katara’s smile isn’t exactly contagious but there’s something immensely reassuring in it, something Zuko can’t help but trust. “I take it you don’t want to talk about it, so-“

“Why are you always early?” Zuko blurts out before he can think better of it. He cringes at the unintended hostility of the statement and mentally kicks himself for what he thinks (no, _knows_ – he’s counting) is the fifth time in the past hour.

“Not a morning person,” Katara says by way of an explanation, and leaves it at that.

“But wouldn’t that make you want to sleep longer?” Zuko’s curiosity gets the better of his awkwardness.

“Well, yeah, but it also means I take forever to wake up,” Katara says, leaning against the bike rack next to him. “If I don’t give myself time to wake up, I’ll bite people’s heads off at practice. So…I just have to get an earlier start than everyone else.”

“Your selflessness is truly commendable,” Zuko says drily, wondering where this sarcasm is coming from. She laughs, though, so he figures it works.

“You know, it used to be a chore, but I kind of don’t hate it now.” Katara shifts her weight from her left foot to her right, looking down at the concrete. “Nothing wakes me up faster than the blast of freezing air in my face the minute I step out of my car. It’s…kinda nice.”

Zuko briefly wonders what kind of crazy person he’s agreed to skate with, because the idea of doing what Katara does and _liking_ it is rather unbelievable to him, but that thought is swiftly crowded out by the realization that, for the first time since they partnered up, he’s _talking_ to her.

Not talking. That happens every day. _Talking-_ talking – that’s new. They talk all the time in practice, sometimes even after. They talk about choreography and music choices and lifts and levels and why Zuko needs to _project_ and Katara needs to _match his dynamic, you look so unbalanced._

And then there’s the post-practice talk, which is rare but has happened about four times, in Zuko’s estimation. They’ve talked about the other skaters at the Caldera Cricket Club sometimes: Zuko warns her about his sister Azula (ladies singles, Team Japan, terrifying) because Katara’s new to this club and the least he can do is warn her not to get in Azula’s way during run-throughs if she values her life. She gives him the brief details of how she came to be here: her last partner unceremoniously dumped her after an injury, Iroh reached out, she agreed, and she and her brother (a hockey player, apparently, who Zuko has yet to meet) packed up and moved from somewhere up north – he can’t remember the town’s name – to train here. Basic things, things they can’t have a working relationship without knowing.

But they’ve never talked just to _talk_ before.

“You know that’s what coffee is for, right?” Zuko asks.

“Coffee does things to me that nothing should,” Katara replies, laughing easily as she leans back into the bike rack.

“Your loss.” He shrugs, and he cannot help but smile in return, even as his uncle walks past the two with a badly-concealed wink in their direction.

They stay like that, contentedly silent, until the doors open and the day begins.

* * *

**_June_ **

There are a lot of things about returning to full-time training that Katara’s not fond of. She hates the way her legs shake when they practice even the simplest lifts, and she can’t shake the feeling that her training mates would rather she hadn’t ever shown up. She misses free time and ice cream and not being sore all over, and she misses seeing her brother for more than two waking hours in a day.

But there are two things about this strange, old-new life that she’ll never complain about.

One of those things is her coach. Iroh is patient and friendly and jovial but he has an eye for the art of the sport that makes Katara want to soak in everything he knows; her last coach was so single-mindedly focus on technique that it is a breath of fresh air. She loves working with him, and she finds herself motivated by the beaming smiles he gives them when they get their patterns just right.

The other is the Finnstep.

Every season, the International Skating Union – figure skating’s governing body – chooses a pattern dance, and all short dances (the longer free dance can be set to any music) must use music that fits its specifications. She’s done tangos and Viennese waltzes and sambas and foxtrots but her favorite has always been the Finnstep. It’s one of the few patterns not based on a ballroom dance; the Finnstep, a bouncy, swingy dance that lends itself to showtunes and the Big Band music of the 1930s, is endemic to ice dance. It’s exuberant and upbeat and _fun,_ even if the footwork can be a headache, and it’s this season’s pattern.

Even if her partner is stiff and awkward as can be, flying across the surface of the ice in a sequence of airy turns and hops as they weave around each other in a crisscrossing pattern, reminds her exactly why she loves this sport.

It’s early in the off-season yet, so their short dance is still gelling, but she doesn’t mind. Surely Zuko can’t be so stiff and awkward forever, she figures, and as they learn the pattern and their “Chicago” short dance begins to take shape, she’s optimistic. She smiles like there’s an audience in the empty stands with every early-morning runthrough and she finds herself humming _All That Jazz_ as she gets ready for the day in the rink’s bathrooms after practice. In those moments it doesn’t matter when cold fear seizes her stomach before a lift, or when Iroh lectures Zuko on his carriage (it’s a running alternation between “stand up straight” and “bend your knees”) after a worryingly stiff run of the Finnstep pattern.

It’s those moments, shimmying with abandon in the dance break Iroh’s choreographed into the middle of their short dance, that make Katara think she might not’ve miscalculated in agreeing to do this after all.

* * *

**_July_ **

**_Ann Arbor, Michigan, USA_ **

It is late July when Nutaraq and Nishimura make their debut. It’s been nearly four months and in all that time, Zuko has _still_ been unable to figure out whether he’s in awe of his partner or slightly terrified of her.

It’s probably both.

That Katara is talented has never been in question. She’s a natural technician _and_ a natural artist, and even when she’s not feeling a program, she manages to maintain the illusion that she is at least marginally well. She’s got a megawatt smile and a fierce perfectionistic streak; she’s as committed to nailing down her interpretation of the music as she is to drilling and perfecting every last turn and change of hold in their short dance. Zuko isn’t dense enough not to realize that he’s incredibly lucky to be skating with her and wonders exactly how desperate she had to have been to pair up with someone like him.

But off the ice, she is unfathomable.

She’s usually polite, but the comfortable, companionable friendliness of their first few weeks of partnership ebbs sometimes. She is as mercurial as she is talented and when she is frustrated, he knows it. He cannot _not_ know it with the way she glares at him when he’s so stiff that he makes the elegant, airy hopping steps of the Finnstep look impossibly awkward next to her elegant, polished ones. But she is kind, too; even when Katara is upset, she never leaves a practice before she’s let her simmering frustration cool, and she’s told him repeatedly that the Finnstep is a bit of an acquired taste and he’ll get used to it.

He’s decided that neutrality is the safest bet, so he endeavors not to disappoint her nor to form an opinion about her, however difficult either of those things may be. He’s certainly feeling neither neutral nor likely to satisfy her as she takes his hand and they take the ice for the short dance at the Ann Arbor Summer Invitational.

Really, he shouldn’t be nervous here, of all places. Ann Arbor’s a tiny summer competition, one mostly populated by local skaters at the lower levels and mid-to-low-tier American teams at the senior level. There can’t be more than twenty people in the stands and he’s willing to bet that most, if not all, of them are related to someone who’s competing. It’s as low-stakes as low-stakes can get, which is the point: Katara can work out any unresolved nerves she still has about lifts (her last partner dropped her from one, apparently, and he figures it was bad if someone as determined as Katara is still afraid of them) or he has about…

Well, everything.

Zuko hasn’t competed in two years. His last competition was a subpar outing at the Junior World Championships when he was a high school senior skating with a very nice girl named Jin who, admittedly, had probably deserved better.

(Twentysomething-Zuko had no problem admitting that high school-Zuko had been a punk.)

She’d decided that she’d had enough of his mercurial temper shortly after and dissolved their partnership to skate with some American named Haru. He feels as rusty as he probably looks and, frankly, he never thought he’d be back out on competitive ice at all, let alone beside a girl who outshines the sun on a good day.

But he’s here, and his heart’s doing its best to beat out of his chest as they take their positions.

He starts their program standing, one leg straight and the other bent so Katara can perch on his knee, hands clasped on her crossed knees and chin tilted just so, and he’s shocked that he can hold her weight on just one leg when he’s as shaky as he feels right now. The silver fringe that acts as the skirt of her dress brushes his thigh as it falls around her and for some reason he misses its comforting brush as the brassy trumpet chords of the intro to _All That Jazz_ plays and she stands, bending her knees and twisting her hips in time to the music as she dips. That trumpet call is repeated, and she turns to him, as if waiting for an answer that Zuko, instructed to play the confused recipient of her flirtation (it isn’t hard), never gives.

Only when the music picks up and she turns, grabbing his hand and setting them in the dance hold they’ll skate their first Finnstep pattern in, does Zuko finally move, spinning her as they weave in and out of each other’s orbits before they line up for the toe hops that signal the beginning of the pattern.

  
And then they are off, and Zuko’s so shot with adrenaline that he can’t even be bothered to remember how stiff and awkward he always is when he skates this pattern. Granted, later he’ll watch the footage of their short dance and see that he _was,_ but right now all he can think of is the steps and the ice beneath his feet, and by the time they skid to a sideways stop halfway through, Katara catches his eye and grins at him like maybe he isn’t failing spectacularly after all.

Well, he’s failed utterly at neutrality, but perhaps he can still hold it together enough to make her happy. Sure, they have other patterns to complete, and he knows that his Quickstep is more cautious than hers and he’s almost as petrified as she is when he has to lift her, but…

He meets her eyes and the sheer _elation_ on her face leaves him no choice. He’s not going to let her down when she loves this sport so much and she’s waited so long to return to it, with him her only hope of the career she longs for.

And when the strike their final pose, sweaty and panting and _thrilled,_ Katara laughs incredulously and throws her arms around his neck.

“Thank you,” she murmurs into is shoulder, standing on her toes so she can reach him, and as he wraps his arms around her waist, something warm and strange and unexpected blooms in his chest. Maybe it’s gratitude, or camaraderie – he doesn’t know. But he likes it, and he likes _this,_ and he realizes why he bothered to do this at all.

“For what?” he asks, still not letting go even when the announcer calls their names and they should be skating off to get their scores.

“Giving me a chance,” she says, and he doesn’t have time to consider what that might mean before she pulls away and leads him off the ice to the Kiss-and-Cry, a sideline box where they’ll sit with Iroh as they wait for their scores.

They’re decent for a first-year team in its first outing of the season, and Iroh claps his nephew on the back before Katara turns to hug him, flushed and content. Zuko barely hears them, though, nor the announcer who calls the next team onto the ice. All he hears are her words, bouncing off the edges of his mind to echo there, over and over, as she leans in for an awkward side-hug and they step out of the Kiss-and-Cry.

_Giving me a chance. Giving me a chance. Giving me a chance._

He wonders what she meant by that when it’s _she_ who’s taking a chance on _him_ by every stretch of the imagination. _She_ is the talent in their pair, sparkling and untouchable with gumption enough for several people and joy that rises all the way to the rafters when she performs; _he_ is the hothead who skates only because he no longer knows what he’d be doing with his life if he didn’t. _She_ was the one sidelined by someone else’s error and cowardice, through no fault of her own; _he_ was sidelined by his own decisions. She is the asset and he is the liability and _everybody_ knows it…

And Katara thinks _he_ took a chance on _her?_

Zuko almost can’t wrap his head around it, but he can wrap his arm around her shoulders, shyly, as they step out into the warmer air of the rink’s foyer.

He doesn’t quite know if it was advisable at first, but the way she turns and smiles at him tells Zuko that it absolutely was.

  
“We did good, Zuko,” she says fondly, leaning her head against his shoulder with easy affection she’s never shown him before.

“We did,” he agrees solemnly, because he knows no other way to agree with her.

  
“I told you you’d get it.”

“You say that because we haven’t competed our free dance yet.”

“I’m talking about the Finnstep, Zuko. That has nothing to do with-“

“Right.”

He pauses, wondering if he should say what’s on his mind. A moment later, he decides to risk it.

“Still stiff?”

“Extremely.” Katara nudges his arm. “But a thousand times better than practice.”

_A thousand is a lot of times,_ he thinks, and he’s a little prouder than he should be.

* * *

**_Later – Hotel Lounge_ **

**_Ann Arbor, Michigan, USA_ **

Katara doesn’t know what she was thinking and when she wanders down to the hotel lounge the night before the free dance, her head reeling, all she wants to do is turn off her brain for a little while.

Instead, she settles into a couch too hard and an undignified shriek jolts her from her thoughts.

“Sorry about that,” the same voice chirps before Katara’s even had a chance to address whatever just happened. “This couch…real bouncy.”

Katara wants to reply, but she’s not even sure where to start.

  
“I hear this place has a curfew. Oops,” the woman – girl? She sounds quite a bit younger than Katara – giggles. “Wait.”

“Hm?” Katara looks up from the cup of chamomile tea she’s holding (complimentary; Iroh’s been complaining about the quality of their free tea all week) and finally meets the woman’s eyes. “Sorry, what?”

  
“I know you,” she says, recognition dawning on her face. “You’re that new ice dancer from the Cricket Club, right? Zuko’s new partner?”

Katara squints, taking in the girl’s round face and grey eyes and trying to decide where she’s seen her. “Um…I am,” she says. “Have…have we met?”

The girl laughs again. “We _train_ together, silly! I’m Ty Lee,” she says.

_Oh._ Katara’s cheeks flush – she should have recognized her. Ty Lee Park is a rising star on the South Korean ladies’ team whose absurd flexibility has been the subject of a million Tumblr gifs. Katara _knows_ this but somehow, the fact escaped her; she trains at Cricket Club but they’ve never spoken.

“Oh, right,” Katara says uncertainly. “I haven’t…I haven’t paid much attention to anything going on at the rink lately, to be honest. I’m sorry I-“

“’Cause you’re too busy getting lost in your partner’s eyes?” Ty Lee says dreamily, and Katara thinks she’s teasing but isn’t quite sure. “I can’t blame you, really-“

“Um. _No.”_ Katara doesn’t know where this Ty Lee girl got _that_ idea, but she’s not about to let that slide. “It’s just hard adjusting to a new partnership, that’s all.”

“Oh, I see,” Ty Lee says, a little chastened. “Well, I’ve known the Nishimuras since we were kids, so if you ever need help translating Zuko-speak, I’m fluent.” Katara’s pretty sure she winks, but she prefers to ignore the implications of that. “Speaking of…you’re the one with the hockey player brother, right?”

Katara arches an eyebrow. “Yeah, but…why?”

Ty Lee looks at her like she’s lost her mind for a moment before she bursts out laughing again. “Um, hello! Have you _seen_ him?”

_Oh._

Katara suddenly feels nauseous.

“Um. I don’t think he’s looking for a relati-“

“Oh, not for me!”

“-onship,” Katara finishes. “Wait, what?”

“I mean, I can appreciate good looks as much as anyone, but I’m actually asking for a friend.” Ty Lee smiles conspiratorially. “She thinks he’s cute, but she’s really shy, and she said she didn’t want to use you to get to him, so I took matters into my own hands.”

“When did you guys even see him?” Of all the turns this night could’ve taken, this one has to be the most mystifying. Sokka’s practices don’t overlap with theirs, and Katara’s not sure when her training mates would’ve met him. And one of them-

_Of course he’s getting all the girls after one appearance,_ she thinks.

  
“That day he came to pick you up from the dance session before the singles one. Some of us were warming up, and he came by to introduce himself.” Ty Lee smiles, clearly implying exactly what Katara hoped she _wouldn’t_ imply. “He made quite the impression.” 

“Of course he did,” Katara sighed. “He doesn’t have a girlfriend, if that’s what you’re asking, and frankly this is weirding me out, so…I’m gonna-“

“Right, sorry.” Ty Lee’s face falls and she plays with the end of her braid. “Well, uh…it was nice talking to you!”

“You too,” Katara says, though she isn’t sure if she means it.

  
All she wanted was a clear head and a good night of sleep before the free dance and instead she has _more_ to occupy her mind.

But at least she’s not thinking of Zuko anymore.

* * *

**_Next Day_ **

**_Free Dance_ **

“Are you doing okay?”

Zuko’s not quite sure what made him ask, but _something_ about Katara doesn’t seem quite right. She nods up at him, inhaling sharply, and begins to adjust the shoulder strap of her dress. Its bodice is blue but its skirt is red and tattered and dyed with that fancy dye technique that Zuko can never remember the name of so that each handkerchief of fabric looks like a flame, and…it _shouldn’t_ look good, not with that color combination, but it does. His own costume, a white button-up under a white-edged blue blazer, is considerably simpler, mimicking that of the protagonist of…whatever thing their free dance music is from. Neither cares nearly as much about the story as they do about the music and the story he’s made up to go with their free dance is entirely invented.

(He hasn’t shared it with her, since she’s already so good at emoting that he figures she doesn’t need it. Besides, something about the idea of it makes him feel weirdly shy.)

“Are you sure?” Zuko presses, because that wasn’t a very convincing nod and he _really_ doesn’t think she’s okay. “Nervous?”

“A little,” she admits, her voice weak. “But it’s okay. We did great in the short, right? Nothing to worry about.”

Not even Katara seems convinced of her own words.

“Okay,” Zuko replies, because he’s really not sure if it’s smart to push any further. Besides, they’re about to be called out onto the ice, and whatever is wrong with her there isn’t time to sort it out.

If there’s anything Zuko can take comfort in as they strike their starting poses, it’s the fact that this program couldn’t be more different than their short dance. Where “Chicago” is jazzy and up-tempo, this one is serious and intense and powerful and all of the things Zuko _understands._ He can do intensity. He can do anguish. And, oddly enough for someone known for stiffness, he can match the music’s sweeping grace as well as Katara can. This dance has none of the intricacy of the Finnstep; while that one played to Katara’s strengths, her hair’s-breadth accuracy and her warmth and charisma, this one plays to Zuko’s.

(Famed ice dance coach Iroh Nishimura seems to many to be a sentimental old man whose stellar choreography doesn’t mask the fact that he hasn’t coached a decent team since the ’06 Olympics, but there’s a _reason_ his name is known and this is it.

Zuko has far more faith in his uncle’s skill than he does in his own.)

“We’ve got this,” Katara whispers as they stand in place, waiting for their music to begin. She sounds for all the world like she’s trying to convince herself.

“We’ve got this,” Zuko repeats, trying not to sound as unconvinced as she does, and the music begins.

It is rare for an ice dancer to fall and Zuko is grateful for that now. Neither of them is feeling quite like themselves today and neither really knows why when nothing about their short dance would engender nerves in the free dance. Their edges are shallower than usual and their turns scratchier; Zuko hears Katara’s toepick scrape the ice – a surefire sign that a turn was completed too far forward on the blade to be cleanly executed – and tries not to cringe. The dance is supposed to be all passion and power and angst but instead it’s as new and skittish as they should’ve expected it to be at a first competition but didn’t, not after yesterday. It’s…

Rough. Very raw, and very rough.

Katara’s expression is crestfallen when they finish even without any major errors and Zuko cannot help but pull her into his arms. She looks so _sad_ that Zuko regrets things he’s pretty sure he never actually did and he’s forgotten all about his goal of neutrality. He doesn’t apologize aloud, but he may as well have.

He wonders if he’s disappointed for her or if, somehow, improbably, it’s because he cares how he performs the way he did before now that he’s got a reason to.

* * *

**_August_ **

****

This is a routine now and Katara relishes that. Routine is security. Routine is home. Maybe it’s a byproduct of growing up with Sokka, but she’s not fond of unpredictability. She thrives when she knows what to expect, when life doesn’t try to throw her for any loops, and perhaps it’s a defense mechanism but it’s oke she’s never going to complain about. And Caldera Cricket Club is nothing if not predictable.

The rink’s full to capacity now, with a few skaters who’d been invited to perform with touring ice shows in Asia over the summer back home, and each skater is as utterly wonderfully predictable as the last. Azula Nishimura, her partner’s sister, finds something to pitch a fit over no matter what the circumstances; she and Mai Uchida, a Japanese teammate in the ladies’ division, are nearly always together. Mai, too, is Predictable: she’s nearly always silent and she watches the world with unchanging disdain, reeling off flawless triple jumps with absolutely no interest at all. Ty Lee joins them sometimes but she’s nothing like them: her Predictability lies in her unceasing perkiness. She is irritatingly nosy sometimes, but she is friendly and cheerful and she doesn’t glare at Katara for so much as breathing the way Azula and Mai do, which she appreciates.

Those are the Predictabilities that Katara isn’t as fond of.

But there are also those she loves. Iroh’s patience and pithy aphorisms and slightly ridiculous assertions that she and Zuko must “give it more spice!” (by which he can only mean things she is entirely unwilling to act out with someone she still barely knows) and ever-present thermos of tea. There’s Zuko’s quiet but oddly comforting presence, which confuses her entirely because she’d heard so much about his temper but never saw it.

There’s Suki Tsumura, a Canadian teammate in the ladies’ division who couldn’t be less like the rivals she trains with if she tried. She’s level-headed and down-to-earth, and if her training partners grumble that their coach, Kyoshi Yukano, is “playing favorites” when she lavishes attention on Suki at Azula’s expense, Suki doesn’t seem to care. She’s Predictably pleasant and Katara takes comfort in knowing she’s got, if nothing else, a firm ally in her.

(She’s noticed the way Suki stares when her brother, keeper of the car keys, has to pick her up, and that’s become another of her Predictable traits; she wonders, lightly, if Sokka ever stares back.)

Then there are the pairs.

The Cricket Club has more than its fair share of elite skaters, but pairs is its crown jewel (a fact of which Azula is plainly contemptuous). No one knows quite how a once-obscure Canadian club managed to attract the most prestigious coach in Chinese pairs skating, but it has, and with that accomplishment comes perhaps Katara’s favorite people at the Cricket Club.

No one who sees Toph Beifong and Aang Tsering skate together ever believes that she’s nearly blind, and for good reason. It’s not without cause that Toph’s one of the most gifted athletes in pairs skating, and though absolutely no one outshines her, Aang is her perfect complement. They offset each other’s strengths and weaknesses but it isn’t just that, nor their stunning technical skill, that’s made them a team to watch right out of the junior ranks.

Their Predictability isn’t just that they’ll land every jump they attempt. It’s the way they have fun together, the way Katara envies them that.

It’s hard for Katara to believe that Toph and Aang get anything done with the way they’re always pulling ridiculous stunts in practice. Their coach, Yangchen, barely seems to begrudge them that, but perhaps it’s because Toph is a taskmaster when she needs to be. She knows that no amount of talent is adequate to coast by on now that they’re seniors, though it might’ve been at the junior level, and, Predictably, she pulls out all the stops when she has to. Still, though, they remain the teenagers they are, and Katara’s grateful that they’ve extended their friendship to her.

Even if it means flying to Germany with Toph’s head on her shoulder.

She wouldn’t mind, usually, but the girl _snores_ and she smacks Aang’s arm when she notices him smirking in her direction because usually it’d be _him_ acting as Toph’s pillow on a plane ride.

But…maybe she _doesn’t_ mind, she thinks after a while. Maybe it’s kind of nice, this Predictability. The skating side of things is still so up in the air as she, Zuko, and what feels like half the Cricket Club head to the Oberstdorf Open for their international season opener that it’s nice knowing things aren’t so uncertain on the personal side.

Katara can’t predict whether they’ll finally get those levels on the Quickstep pattern, or whether they’ll last at all. She certainly can’t predict the results of the Oberstdorf Open. But perhaps, if the people of the Caldera Cricket Club stay Predictable, she can take the uncertainty. Feeling unusually fond, Katara ruffles Toph’s hair and leans back in her seat before she returns to the book she’s been reading.

They’ve got far to go and all she can do now is wait.

****


	2. City Lights

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Zuko and Katara make their Grand Prix debut at Skate America.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> a run-down of how the Grand Prix series works: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISU_Grand_Prix_of_Figure_Skating
> 
> Sorry this took so long to get out! I was trying to finish Give The Game Away first. Now that it's done, I can focus on this boi again!

**_Caldera Cricket Club_ **

**_September_ **

****

Six months after they agree to pair up, Zuko and Katara settle into a routine as practiced as their programs. They arrive at five – now, they warm up outside of the locked together, two lonely, ridiculous figures in the early-autumn gloom. Inside, they warm up together once more; they stretch, prepare their muscles to work, and run lifts. They are always easier in on solid ground in shoes, but Zuko can’t help but notice that Katara’s legs still shake beneath his hands when he throws her across his shoulders to land with one foot planted on his thigh, the other balanced on his shoulder.

Then they practice: hours upon hours, some with Iroh, some on their own. They are on the ice until ten, drilling patterns for the first two hours and lifts and twizzles and programs for the other two. In April they would scarcely look at each other when they stopped at the boards for water; now they’ll make enough small talk to drag out the scant minutes of rest that they can afford as they drink.

Zuko finds himself more charmed than annoyed by her incessant cheeriness, after a while.

  
Katara doesn’t think Zuko means to be as funny as he is but she never fails to laugh when they talk.

They are a team. They enjoy each other’s company. It’s…surprisingly organic, this thing neither of them ever wanted, and they are glad it exists now, as they analyze footage from the Oberstdorf Open – third place, not awful even in a field as uncompetitive as the one at that event (a typical feeder, one federations send their newest partnerships to in order to get their feet under them) - in painful detail.

Katara’s apparently a true believer in video analysis as a mental exercise, because they’ve filmed their pattern every single day since they arrived home and she’s been laying on thick, watching each day’s video and comparing it to their performance in Oberstdorf. She’s dead-serious, scribbling notes on technical points they missed in a notebook, and Zuko, who has never lightened up in his _life,_ almost wants to tell her to let loose.

“We missed that key point,” Katara mutters to herself, pausing the video they’d taken today and then scribbling. “That was supposed to be an outside edge.”

“Nerd,” Zuko huffs, trying not to let her see that he’s cringing at his own slumped posture. He lightly elbows her and she huffs in annoyance.

“Nerds get the points, though,” Katara replies, unpausing the video again.

“Katara, is this really necessary?” Zuko protests, again trying not to let her see how embarrassed he is at his own performance in this video of a lackluster pattern he’s seen far too many times.

“We need to drill it,” she replies, biting her lip in concentration as she pauses the video again. “That three-turn was a little jumpy. Careful with that.”

“ _Katara.”_

_“_ What?” she asks, irritated.

“This is making me nervous.”

Her expression softens and she lays her hand on his shoulder. Touch, Zuko now knows, is Katara’s favorite and most native language, and he goes a little bit warm in the chill of the rink’s lobby every time she touches him like this – lightly, casually, without a compelling reason to. “We’ve improved so much,” she says, and he knows when he meets her eyes that she means it.

“We leave for Skate America in a month, Katara. And we haven’t had a single day when you didn’t pick this video apart.”

“Zuko, we could’ve won Worlds with this short dance and I’d still find something to nitpick. You should know that by now.”

She has a point: she is encouraging, but Katara does not mince words. If he were still as…rusty as he was months ago, she would have said so.

He tries to remember that when they take the ice again for yet another run-through.

* * *

**_San Jose, California, United States_ **

**_October_ **

They arrive in San Jose on a foggy October morning, not realizing that nearly every San Jose morning is foggy and this is not, unfortunately for the dramatic effect of the story when Katara tells it to everyone back at home, unusual.

Truthfully, Katara knows they’re as prepared for this as they could be, but her stomach still sends up a riot of butterflies every time she thinks of the reason they’re here. Skate America, this year held in northern California, kicks off the Grand Prix of Figure Skating, an annual series of six elite international events each fall which culminate in the Grand Prix Final in December, where the six top-scoring competitors across the series in each of the four disciplines compete. Though the season began months ago, it truly begins in full force now, with the Grand Prix series; just to have been chosen to compete at a Grand Prix event at all is an honor.

Katara’s only competed at one, Skate Canada International two seasons ago. She and her partner had been host-picked, a bone usually thrown to less-than-elite skaters with potential who represented the country hosting the event, and though they’d performed well, the memory is soured by their ugly breakup only months later.

So to be here, starting over…it feels even more like a reset than pairing up with Zuko did, more than the Ann Arbor Invitational or the Oberstdorf Open. As she breathes in the misty, sea-sprayed air, Katara has to fight off excitement and trepidation and anxious nausea all at once.

“You good?” Zuko asks, removing one of his earbuds and glancing over at Katara worriedly on the shuttle from the airport to their hotel.

She flushes; she hadn’t realized that her nervousness was so obvious. “Yeah, I’m good,” she reassures him with a tight smile.

“Okay.” He slips his earbud back in. “Let me know if you need anything.”

It’s an odd request, one that makes little sense in an airport shuttle when there’s very little that he even could do for her, but it warms her to know he noticed, that he can read her well enough to know that something’s off even as she tries to hide her nerves.

“Thank you,” she replies, though he can’t hear her.

Perhaps it’s just the effect of time spent together, because it’s a little bit difficult not to know a person when one spends six hours a day with them no matter how little one might care about that person (and though Zuko won’t admit it, it seems that he cares quite a lot). But…

  
It feels like something Katara hasn’t known in a long, long time.

* * *

**_Practice_ **

**_Two Days Until Skate America_ **

****

Before he’d arrived, Zuko had all but expected to be a bundle of uncontrollable nerves for the majority of the pre-event practices here at Skate America. He’s never been half of a team good enough to compete at a Grand Prix event before – he’d still been at the Junior level when his last partner had broken off their partnership, and there’s an entirely separate Junior Grand Prix series that isn’t nearly prestigious as this one – so he doesn’t exactly have a frame of reference. But he’s seen Azula compete in what feels like a thousand of these things, even though she only passed the senior-eligible age of fifteen two seasons ago and competes for a country with one of the most cutthroat ladies’ fields in the world, and he knows what they’re like.

Ten elite teams crammed on the ice at the same time, most either aggressively avoiding each other or attempting to intimidate one another, and all trying to cram in as much practice as they can before what, for the teams that will populate the bottom half of the standings, could be the most prestigious event of their careers.

In other words: a simmering pot of hellish anxiety.

“We’re up,” Katara tells him as they line up to run through their Quickstep pattern for the third time.

“Hm?”

“Our program?” Katara takes his arm, seeing that she’s getting nowhere with words, and drags him to the boards. “Jun and Chan just finished. We were next in line.”

“Oh, right.” Zuko shakes himself, at least internally, in an attempt to snap out of his nerve-induced stupor. “Um. Does this mean we have to talk to them?”

  
It’s a legitimate question: the team running through their program with music has to wear a pair of orange belts to indicate that they have the right of way, and Jun and Chan, a team consisting of an American partner and a Taiwanese one who, inexplicably, somehow represent France (Zuko doesn’t ask), and whose former half was the latter half of Zuko’s longest-lasting partnership in his early teens, are wearing them now. If they want the belts, there’s a legitimate possibility he’ll have to do the thing he’s been dreading even more than a possible collision with the Russian team favored to win:

Talk to Jun Maeda for the first time in six years. 

  
“Zuko, come _on.”_ Katara crosses her arms. “She won’t bite.”

“I’m actually not entirely sure that she won’t,” Zuko protests, crossing his arms in a mirror of her posture.

“Fine, then,” Katara sighs, and _she_ is the one who skates over to Jun and Chan to ask for both belts.

_Thank you, Katara,_ he thinks but can’t bring himself to say as profusely as he wants to. “Thanks,” he says with a perfunctory nod when she comes back, before tying the length of hideous neon orange fleece around his waist.

“’Course,” she replies.

He is meticulously careful this time, when he lifts her, to be _absolutely certain_ of the placement of his hands and the solidity of his grip on her. She doesn’t shake anymore, but he knows she’s still nervous, and it is all he can do to let her know that he will never drop her, never do less than his best to ensure that she can trust him.

After all, if she’s going to have his back like that, he ought to have hers.

* * *

**_Skate America – Short Dance_ **

****

For the first time in her life, Katara is _glad_ that the audience watching her has absolutely no idea who she is.

Oh, sure, there are bound to be diehard figure skating fans here who know her name. She knows the types – members of internet message boards, Tumblr gif-makers, middle-aged corporate types secretly watching livestreams of obscure B-level events on the clock – and she’s sure there are quite a few out in the audience, eagerly awaiting the ‘true’ debut of the strangest new partnership anyone’s seen in a while. But most of them – locals who don’t know much about skating, preteen skaters and their parents – won’t have heard of the brand-new Canadian team taking the ice to kick off the short dance.

And though Katara will always prefer to be the one to beat, she finds that it feels good to be anonymous. After all, no one expects an anonymous team to have filmed and dissected and drilled its patterns so exhaustively that they hate the sound of their own music. (Zuko claims to have the same reaction to the opening trumpet call of “All That Jazz” as he does to the alarm he wakes up to at four every morning, and as much as Katara loves it, she can’t deny that he has a point.) No one expects her effortless charisma or the fact that Zuko is so awkward in his role that it seems almost endearing, almost intentional.

So with a flick of her hips, she begins, and she intends to show them exactly how much they’ll want to remember the names Nutaraq and Nishimura.

(If she catches Zuko’s eyes and smiles as they skid to a stop in the middle of the finnstep, setting up for the intricate toe steps that break up the two moving sections of the dance, well…that is her secret to keep.)

There will be no press conference, they know, not for them. That is an honor reserved for the very top teams, those with years of experience and the reputation and polish and poise it takes to place at an event like this. But if there was, Katara likes to imagine, as the music slows, “All that Jazz” to “Nowadays” for the slower Quickstep section, they’d ask her how she kept her head so clear. “You seem so confident making this debut,” she imagines them asking. “What’s your secret?”

_Acting skills,_ she thinks wryly, shooting the audience a megawatt smile as Zuko dips her and, lightning-quick, pulls her back up and across his body. Because really, as much as she claims to be having fun when she performs, she knows that all she is doing is distracting herself. She’s never really let go of the pressure, never truly skated with full confidence that she knows what she’s doing; she just keeps her mind too occupied to think about it.

As she might have expected, she and Zuko seem to have made a lukewarm but nonetheless rather pleasant impression on the audience, judging by the smattering of applause – it’s somewhere between polite and enthusiastic – that greets their closing pose. They shrug, a _what-can-you-do_ sort of gesture, and he pulls her into a rather perfunctory hug before they skate off. Iroh awaits them at the boards, handing them both the rubber guards they wear over their blades when they aren’t on the ice so they won’t dull them.

“Stiff,” he says, a rather cutting one-word indictment, before he smiles. “But in comparison to Oberstdorf…”

“Hey, I’ll take it.” Zuko embraces his uncle far more comfortably than he did Katara (it stings, stupidly).

“Katara, you were brilliant,” Iroh says after Zuko releases him, pulling her in for a crushing hug of her own.

“I’d hardly call it that,” she replies. “But…thank you.”

Coming from Iroh Nishimura, former National Ballet of Japan principal turned (improbably) ice dancer turned (even more improbably) coach, choreographer, and figure skating legend, it is quite possibly the highest praise Katara has ever received, and she does not know what to think.

Perhaps “brilliant” can work with a 61.23 – decent, but they’re going to wind up in the bottom three or so – after all.

  
(Buoyant and discouraged all at once, she can only hope that it can.)

* * *

**_Night Before the Free Dance_ **

_Ninth._

For some reason, the word rings like a death knell in Zuko’s half-asleep mind.

_Ninth._ Their placement at the end of the short dance.

_Ninth._ The look of disappointment on Katara’s face when she’d seen the final standings.

_Ninth._ Breathing hard after three minutes of everything they had, knowing it wouldn’t be enough.

_Ninth._ His fault.

_Ninth._ His uncle had said that Katara had been brilliant. _Brilliant_ deserves better than _ninth._

_Ninth._ With any other partner, she’d have been sensational.

_Ninth._ Why can’t he just get it together?

_Ninth._ He hadn’t been able to look Katara in the eyes after that, knew it was why he’d turned down her invitation to dinner with Aang and Toph, who are going into _their_ second program sitting in a cool third place. Third at their first Grand Prix at the senior level. _Third._ He – _ninth –_ couldn’t look them in the eye, either. _Katara deserved that._

_Ninth._ Why does he care?

_Ninth._ Maybe because she’s the only hope he’s had in a long time.

_Ninth._ She reminds him that there’s a _reason_ he’s still doing this.

_Ninth._ He’s going to do better for her.

_Ninth._ Even if all she is to him is a partner, he’s going to do her proud.

_Ninth._ Perhaps the problem is that he knows that she is more. 

* * *

**_Skate America – Free Dance_ **

****

Katara is loath to admit it, but in the case of their free dance, Zuko’s artistic interpretation tops hers by miles.

It irritates her, irrationally, because that’s supposed to be _her_ thing. She’s the performer, the one who shines, and as much as she likes her partner, she quite likes the spotlight, too. She likes being the one who slips effortlessly into the mind and body of someone else when she skates.

But Zuko’s preferred interpretation technique – “make up a story about your program involving two people and act like one of its characters” – is rather genius in the case of their free dance. It’s from an anime, they both know, but one with a plot so confusing that neither of them bothered to watch past the first episode; the idea of basing their program’s story off of that of the source material was scrapped before it even began. In its wake, Zuko, apparently, created his own storyline for the program, and Katara has to admit that it works.

_So, it starts off slow, right?_ He’d explained. _Those…sweeping chords. Sounds sad. So, basically, at the beginning of the story, I like to think…you’re someone I’ve known for a really long time, and you’re kind of in a dark place, right? And at first, during that slow section, I’m just sort of sitting there being upset about it. Then the strings come in around the minute mark, and it’s the same motif, but bigger. You’ve kind of hit this point of no return and I don’t know if I’m ever going to get you back. Then we get to the minute-and-a-half point, and these cello arpeggios come in, right? That’s when I decide I’m not letting this happen – that I’m gonna fight for you. By two minutes, we’re in this kind of push-pull – I’m doing everything I can to get you to come back, and you’re resisting, and then at two-thirty, on the big crescendo, I’m more desperate than ever, and our fight gets worse, and I’m just begging you to pull yourself out of this, right? And…that’s the story, I guess._

She’d not known what to say to that, save _how does it end?_

_That’s for you to decide._

_What am I to you in this story, then?_

He’d shrugged. _Something important._

_And you to me?_

Another shrug. _Someone who cares too much._

She’s too stubborn to admit it, but she hasn’t stopped thinking about it since.

She skates as the _something important,_ as if he is the _someone who cares too much._ Katara’s always been good at _big –_ at sass, at joy, at seduction (in the regrettable case of one tango program with her old partner that she’d knocked out of the park but wishes she could erase permanently from her memory) – but longing and heartache and struggle and _pain_ are harder to portray. Skating is her _escape_ from those things and the idea of deliberately chasing them and bending them to her will, using them as tools rather than allowing them to consume her as she’s wont to do…

She hates it.

But it’s a good story, and it’s a story that makes _sense,_ and she can do it. _Zuko_ can do it – he’s night and day, this compared to their short dance. In their short dance, Zuko has all the personality of a brick wall, but now, as he catches her eye and her hand before they enter hold for their first dance sequence, he is all fire, simmering intensity and wholehearted determination. He _will not let go,_ she knows, and he is so utterly invested in the idea of the invented character he must hold onto that he even convinces _her._

Katara has her moments of stiffness too, but if playing the broken someone and the someone who cares too much is going to help her overcome it, she cannot refuse to do it.

So she loses herself, and when he throws her up and over his shoulder and she mounts her blade solidly against his thigh, stretching her arms outwards before she falls backwards into his waiting arms and her blades meet the ice again, she barely remembers to be afraid.

And Katara knows by the crushing hug that Zuko pulls her into when they finish that she has done what she needed to do.

“You were thinking about the story, weren’t you?” he asks, resting his chin atop her head.

She nods against his shirt, and if she’s not inventing things, she’s pretty sure he squeezes her waist in reply.

* * *

**_The Night of the Free Dance_ **

****

“Fifth place? Not awful!” Toph crows, punching Katara’s arm. “We should go celebrate!”

“Toph, I’m not taking you drinking.” Katara crosses her arms and Zuko almost chuckles – she’s taken an almost maternal liking to Toph, and she doesn’t mince words. “You’re _sixteen.”_

“But-“

“Toph. _Illegal.”_

“That isn’t what I meant, anyway,” Toph huffs. “Aang and I just really want to go…do something fun, I don’t know. And you’re the one with the rental car.”

“Oh, I see how it is,” Katara teases. “You’re extorting me.”

“I am not _extorting_ you!” Toph looks much more smug than outraged. “If I was extorting you, you’d never know it.”

Aang returns from a brief absence with what appear to be fruit snacks, probably purchased at the hotel’s convenience store. (Zuko knows that Toph carries a bag of them everywhere despite her coach’s best efforts to impress upon her the vital importance of _actual nutrition;_ he’d probably been getting her a replacement.) “Yeah!” he jumps in, not missing a beat. “We’re not that far from San Francisco!”

Katara pauses, considering. “San Francisco, hm?”

“We just think it would be fun,” Aang tells her, shrugging. “We could all use it, you know?”

“Could be cool.” Zuko’s almost surprised to hear himself reply, but he does. “After the gala tomorrow?”

“Yeah!” Aang beams, clearly quite pleased that his efforts succeeded. “We can get dinner and stuff!”

“You and food,” Toph grouses, but she’s smiling, too. “Can’t you ever think about anything else?”

“Well, better that then the triple loop I stepped out of earlier.”

  
Toph hits his arm. “Doesn’t matter, idiot. We still got third.”

“But we could’ve been second-“

“Quit complaining.” This time, her arm-smacking is decidedly less affectionate. “Now, are we thinking swanky restaurant or touristy one?”

“Do I look like I can afford swanky?” Katara crosses her arms again. “Do _any_ of us?”

“My treat.” Toph smirks. “Got to give the old fake I.D. a test run somewhere with a decent wine list.”

“ _Toph.”_

“Couldn’t resist,” Toph replies. “Anyways. If you guys want to go get dinner, I’m down.”

“You’re the one who _suggested_ it, Toph!”

“Fair point.” She shrugs. “Well, I’ll get us a table. See ya.”

Zuko and Katara watch Toph go, Aang close behind, and exchange a somewhat worried look.

“Um…how did we just get roped into chaperoning a date at a fancy restaurant an hour away for two sixteen-year-olds?” Katara asks.

“Is it a date?” Zuko looks rather shocked. “I had no idea…”

“No, I don’t think so,” Katara says, though she doesn’t sound certain. “Point still stands though.”

“Good luck with the whole ‘fun, relaxing afternoon’ thing,” Zuko sighs.

* * *

**_After the Gala_ **

****

“Wait, were we supposed to dress up?” Aang looks crestfallen when he meets Katara and Zuko at the car.

  
The partners glance at each other – he in a full suit, she in a gold cocktail dress and pumps that she just _knows_ she’s going to be taking off by the end of the night – and blush profusely.

“I just thought…” Zuko stammers.

“Toph said the place was fancy,” Katara finishes.

Aang glances down at his t-shirt, which bears what looks like a band logo and a great deal of Mandarin writing, and flushes as red as the other two. “Sorry,” he mutters. “I thought…”

“I’ll tell them you’re the CEO of a tech startup,” Toph tells him, half-serious. “No one’s gonna question that.”

“You sure?”

“Absolutely sure.” Toph smirks, straightening the striped white blouse she’s wearing under her pantsuit. “Now let’s get going.”

* * *

**_San Francisco_ **

****

“Cheers,” Katara says, raising a glass of iced tea (she’d refused to order wine with Zuko even though, at twenty, she could drink back home in Canada) and clinking it against Zuko’s wineglass. She feels impossibly fancy, dressed to the nines by the panoramic window of a posh restaurant she couldn’t have afforded in a million years, and it seems like something worth doing, so she toasts.

“Um. Cheers,” he repeats, risking a quick glance back at her. “To…not totally failing.”

All three of his companions chuckle at that. “To avoiding total annihilation,” Katara replies, looking up at him through wide, questioning eyes.

He meets them, _finally,_ his gaze unwavering and as nervous as hers. There’s nothing more to be said, but his eyes seem to say it anyway.

That is when she realizes that this feels an awful lot like an overpopulated date.

* * *

****

Every so often, Katara looks over her shoulder to see Aang and Toph giggling over something they’re watching on his phone in the backseat, or to her right to see Zuko slumped against the window of their rental car. For one, she simply smiles, heartened that two people under as much pressure as Beijing’s athletes de jour and the latest in a very, _very_ long line of prestigious Chinese pairs are could still be young, still act like the sixteen-year-olds they are. For the other, she turns down her music and wishes she could drape a blanket over him.

She does not bother to wake him when they cross the Golden Gate Bridge, though she does shoot a pointed glance back at Aang and Toph in the rearview mirror. Aang, at least, looks up from the phone; Toph really doesn’t see the point of doing so, poor as her eyesight is, but she concedes in taking out her earbud – they’re sharing – so Aang can describe the scenery to her. And as for Katara, she merely gazes out at the view as she drives, a smile stretching across her face entirely of its own will. Never mind that it took them long enough just to get to San Francisco in the first place, or that they have no _need_ to be here for any practical reason. Katara’s just always wanted to do this, to drive across this bridge and to see the lights of the city come on as if to welcome her.

They’re coming from the south, so they have to drive through San Francisco to cross it at all; going north, it was darker, the city receding behind their car, but they’ve got to go back the same way to return home. And after a long evening, dinner followed by as much sightseeing as they could reasonably do in the dark, nothing seems like a better cap-off to Katara than a drive back.

This time, when she drives them across, they descend into a city awash in light, and she cannot resist waking her partner.

  
“Zuko?” she asks, waiting for him to stir. “You’re going to want to see this.”

  
“Mmrgh,” he groans, blinking as he wakes. “Wha’?”

“Look at that, Zuko,” she breathes, her face lit brightly as the skyline with unrestrained wonder. “Just… _look_ at it.”

“Pretty,” he comments absentmindedly, openly watching _her_ and not the view.

“You’re not looking,” she murmurs, risking a hand off the wheel to gesture out at the view. “I mean…it’s _beautiful.”_

“It’s a city,” Zuko says flatly.

Clearly, a city skyline doesn’t hold the wonder for Zuko that it does for Katara, but she’s too happy to care.

“But it’s beautiful,” she repeats. She has to slam on her breaks, too absorbed in the view to notice the brakelights of the cars in front of her, and Zuko glares, but he’s not really all that upset.

“I guess it could be,” Zuko says noncommittally, still watching her face. Her cheeks are bright and her dimples punctuate a smile that he privately thinks could light the city – _forget solar power, just plug a generator into that smile,_ he thinks wryly – and, wearing a baggy grey “I <3 SF” sweatshirt two sizes too big over a cocktail dress (‘I was cold,’ she’d claimed) with hair matted from a day in the wind, she is nothing short of radiant.

“Yeah,” she laughs softly, shaking her head in what seems like disbelief. “Makes me proud that I even exist, you know?”

“Um…no, I don’t.” Zuko has no clue what she means, but he finds himself curiously intent on finding out. “What do you mean?”

“It’s just…I don’t know. Cities make me feel things,” she says sheepishly, as if realizing how strange she sounds. “They’re just these…epicenters of activity, you know? Like, being in a city full of life that’s just buzzing all around you feels like…I don’t know, like I’m a part of the future. And I _love_ that.” She smiles over at him, tearing her eyes off of the view for a moment. “They make me feel like us puny little people, just going about their days, can create things that matter, and it’s…Spirits, it’s _magical.”_

“I never thought of it that way,” Zuko says thoughtfully, an entirely unwanted smile fighting its way onto his face with almost no effort. He’s powerless right now, and he’s sure she knows it. “I look at a city and I just see stress, but you see…I don’t know, impact? Hope? That’s crazy to me.”

_You always see the sunshine, even when every trace of light around us comes from a bulb,_ he thinks, but doesn’t say.

“Hope. That’s a good way to put it,” she says, taking a deep breath and then letting her shoulders fall. “I’m…I’m glad we got to see this.”

“I’m glad you got to see it, too,” Zuko says it, and he means it with every fiber of his being.

“No, stupid, I’m glad _we_ got to see it.” She reaches across the console to squeeze his arm. “ _We. Us. Together.”_

“Oh.” Zuko’s cheeks flush and he’s grateful that his face is partially obscured by the darkness. “Um…me too.”

Together, they descend into a city bathed in brilliant light, and it is hard to imagine an end to this moment. 

(Even as time feels frozen, Katara wishes she could pause her life at this moment, just to hold it for a little while.) 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> That Golden Gate Bridge scene...sort of happened to me. Granted, I was thirteen and in the backseat, but driving over the bride at night just...left me with this feeling of awestruck wonder and pride at being human that I have never forgotten. It was a beautiful moment and I wanted to capture that here.


	3. Crossings

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It has been three thousand years. 
> 
> Sorry.

**_Flying – en route to NHK Trophy_ **

**_Tokyo, Japan_ **

****

“Whatcha reading?”

Zuko glances up from his book, not entirely back to reality yet. “Hm?”

Katara leans over an inch further in the aisle seat to peer over at the book in his lap, her chin brushing his shoulder. “I asked what you were reading.”

“Oh, uh. Just…this.” He closes the book, using his thumb to hold his place, and shows her the cover, unsure why he feels like he’s been caught red-handed.

“ _A Faraway and Fast-Approaching Point,”_ Katara reads off the cover, scrunching her nose. “Never heard of it. What’s it about?”

“It’s, um. It’s sort of fantasy but also…not.”

Katara moves back so her head won’t be so close to his shoulder, but she still looks at the book – pointedly _not_ at Zuko – with interest. “That’s kinda vague.”

“So. It’s in this fictional world that’s sorta like…I really don’t know what time period, but not modern. Same as our world, except that the countries have different names and there are these…people who can control the elements. And there’s this war going on, and it’s split into two halves, so the first is about the end of the war and the second is about what happens after, and…” Zuko trails off, surprised at how fast he’s speaking. He had no idea he was so excited about the book, a critically-acclaimed novel he’d never really wanted to read but picked up in the airport’s bookstore on a whim, until she’d asked about it. “Basically, the first half is about this resistance movement that’s trying to help end the war, through the eyes of this orphan girl who joins when she’s a little kid. Then the Emperor of the, like, enemy country dies at the end of the war and his daughter takes over, and she appoints the girl from the first half as…like, this book’s equivalent of the CSIS director. And the second half is about all of the political stuff that goes on after that-“

“You must really like this book.” Katara keeps her eyes down, not really sure why. “Sounds good.”

“It is. I hate reading books with ‘New York Times Bestseller’ on the cover, but this one actually doesn’t suck.”

“Hipster,” Katara teases, lightly elbowing his side. “And doesn’t _every_ book say that?”

Zuko shrugs. “Fair. Also, _ow.”_

“I barely even hit you,” Katara mutters, but her smirk lets him know otherwise.

“Hm. Well, if that’s how you’re going to be, I’m going to get back to my reading.” He _finally_ looks up at her, and the way his face goes hot at the comfortable mirth of her expression makes him grumpier than he has any right to be. “Don’t you have anything else to do?”

  
Though it’s been months since he’s snapped at her, Katara doesn’t seem particularly hurt. “Nope,” she says, and – _purely_ out of spite, she insistently tells herself – she plops her chin down on his shoulder. “But I do kind of wanna check out this book you’re so in love with.”

“Be my guest,” Zuko says under his breath. He hopes against hope that she won’t notice the odd, sudden stiffness in his neck as she leans against his shoulder, but he knows she will. “Good luck keeping up with the plot three-quarters of the way in.”

She doesn’t respond, and he _knows_ he could easily shake her off if he just sat back against the headrest and left her no room to lean on him, but he doesn’t. He knows he _should,_ because this is _weird_ and he doesn’t know how to deal with it and if she falls asleep on him he’s well and truly _screwed,_ but he still can’t bring himself to move.

  
He feels like a cat has fallen asleep in his lap, which is strange, because Zuko has never understood people who refuse to move when their pets fall asleep on them before. Except that she’s _not_ a cat, no matter what the first syllable of her name may indicate, and she’s very much a _person._ And he realizes that those guys he’d known in his two years of college, pre-dropout, who’d let their girlfriends sleep on them and gotten unnecessarily riled up when anyone was loud or jostled them are a much more apt comparison.

And that is _terrifying._

Zuko is fully aware that his current thought process is scarily like that of a skittish fifteen-year-old at the homecoming dance, but he isn’t really present enough to be worried about it. He isn’t really present enough to _read,_ which is unfortunate, because the Spymistress is just about to find out why the Orchid Society is trying to kill the Empress and he’s been anxiously awaiting that reveal for at least a hundred pages. At this rate, as he absentmindedly turns the pages, Katara is going to have a better understanding of the plot than he does by the end.

(That is, assuming she’s actually reading. And the idea that her head is on his shoulder for any other reason is one that he stubbornly refuses to entertain.)

“Is it a pyramid scheme? I bet it’s a pyramid scheme.” Katara’s voice in his ear snaps him out of it for long enough to roll his eyes. Apparently she _is_ reading as the Spymistress unravels the conspiracy that’s been unfolding for a hundred-odd pages, though he’s not sure where _that_ interpretation came from.

“Do you even know what a pyramid scheme _is?”_

“Yeah, and?”

Zuko scoffs. “It’s not a pyramid scheme.”

“I think it is.”

“Why would they be trying to off the Empress for a pyramid scheme? Is she gonna outlaw their illegal makeup-sales scam?” he challenges, because snark is much easier than actual thoughts right now.

“Well, _duh._ Commandant Guo is never gonna get his pink Mary Kay car if he doesn’t assassinate her before she gets wise to them.” Katara clearly knows she’s being ridiculous, and her laugh rings out in the half-empty cabin, loud enough to wind her up on the receiving end of a few extremely rankled glares. She lets herself slump against his side, still laughing, and…

  
It’s the weirdest thing, but as ridiculous and undignified as this whole thing is, he finds himself laughing, too. Had that been her intention?

What if it had? What if she’d posed that theory because she _wanted_ to make him laugh? Why would she want to do that? What could she stand to gain from it? They’re on a _plane,_ after all, and people on planes don’t tend to be too tolerant of excessive noise. So why…?

“You look like you’ve seen a ghost, Zuko. Lighten up.” Katara squeezes his bicep and finally lets go, leaning back against the headrest of her own seat again. “And when you finish that book, I want to borrow it.”

“Oh. Um…sure.”

Strangest of all is this: he misses the weight of her chin on his shoulder.

* * *

**_Day 1: NHK Trophy_ **

**_Tokyo, Japan_ **

****

Half of the work of skating well and scoring well is acting. Without it, ice dance is nothing more than fancy footwork. Katara knows this. It _should_ be the simplest thing in the world for her, a girl for whom commitment and enthusiasm have long been constants in everything she’s done. All she’s got to do is play a part and she excels at that. It’s even been easy enough to convince herself, lately, that she’s doing a fine job of stepping into the roles she has to act out when she steps on the ice.

But that is before she knows what it is to be on a practice session with Oma Li and Shu Inori.

Oma and Shu are nothing short of legendary in the ice dance world. An American team who’d had a wildly successful ten-year career culminating in a silver medal (the expected gold lost to a French team no one liked as much as the judges did) at last year’s Olympics, they’ve made a return that absolutely nobody had expected. Their chemistry, their connection, their interpretation are unmatched. Katara was fifteen when their legendary free dance to the music of a classic (and incredibly steamy) Chinese film called _Love Amongst the Dragons_ debuted, but it’s so heated that it still makes Katara blush every single time she pulls it up on YouTube (which she does far too often) – that’s the kind of chemistry that Li and Inori are known for. And they were assigned to NHK after winning Skate America by twenty-seven points.

  
Katara isn’t sure whether she should be honored to be sharing the ice with them or so despondent at the way every team present pales in comparison that resistance – even mere existence – seems futile.

  
“Katara, you’re staring.” Zuko, apparently, is quite immune to the thrall that Li and Inori tend to cast over…well, just about everyone.

“I know.” She doesn’t bother trying to deny it.

Zuko tries again. “Katara, we need to run the choreo sequence again.”

“Okay.” She skates off when he does, hand in his, but she can’t tear her eyes away from Oma and Shu, running a lift from their free dance. It makes Katara sweat just to watch its heinously complicated entry, as seamless as they’ve managed to make it seem. “Um. I had a note about this, but…I can’t remember it.”

“You’re really out of it, aren’t you.” It isn’t a question.

“I’m sure you can understand why.”

“Well, yeah, but you need to snap out of it,” Zuko tells her. “We need to run our free dance and we’re never going to get there if you can’t focus.”

“Wow. Look who’s the responsible one now.”

“Hey, _one_ of us has to be.”

“Well, yeah.” Katara shrugs. “Sorry. I get really starstruck.”

“I could tell.” Zuko raises his eyebrows. “But we really don’t have time for that right now.”

Katara would normally never let herself be distracted this way right before one of the biggest competitions of the year, and she knows it, but that knowledge doesn’t really help. And she hates to admit how right he is.

  
Nevertheless, she finally manages to divert her focus to the choreographic step sequence that they lost a level on at Skate America, and though she’s still not entirely _there,_ it’s better than nothing.

* * *

**_NHK Trophy_ **

**_Later, the Same Day_ **

****

“So…why are we here?” Katara takes a seat beside Zuko, bundled up in twice the amount of clothing she’d wear on the ice even though they were practicing in the same building all morning. Below them, the competitors in the ladies’ event cut across the ice, some barely managing to dodge each other as they warm up. “Your sister?”

Zuko glances down at the ice, his eyes drifting to Azula warming up in the middle circle painted on the ice. She’s always had an unusual way of warming up: she hates having people in her way so she warms up in a different order than the rest of the skaters to avoid them, starting with spins. In Zuko’s humble opinion, it’s an absolutely awful way to start a warmup – spinning when she’s still cold and disoriented and her legs haven’t had a chance to warm up yet – but, then again, Azula has never really had to follow the same rules as he has.

There are things that come with being a prodigy that Zuko, who has decidedly _never_ been one, will probably never understand. Azula’s the one with the natural talent; Azula can warm up by spinning if she wants to and it’ll make absolutely no difference.

“Yeah, something like that,” he replies. Katara leaves one seat between them when she sits down and he’s almost disappointed, almost tempted to move over a seat to be nearer to her. But he doesn’t. That would be weird.

“She doesn’t come to our practices.” She isn’t asking.

“No, she doesn’t.” Zuko shrugs. “I’m not really sure why I do this. I guess…I like to know she has someone looking out for her.”

“She doesn’t look like she needs it.” Katara smiles fondly, but her words don’t betray any of that fondness.

“Well, no, she doesn’t.” There’s a lot that Zuko could unpack there, but he doesn’t. “But still.”

“But still,” she repeats. “So. She the favorite here?”

Zuko almost snorts. “Where _isn’t_ she the favorite?”

“True,” Katara agrees. She’s seen Azula reel off far too many flawless triple axels – in and out of competition – to doubt that for a second. She’s a rare talent even in the obscenely deep ladies’ field in Japan. “But…like, by how much?”

“Her closest competition is probably this Russian fifteen-year-old who looks twelve and has, like, five planned quads.”

“…how is she the favorite, then?”

“The Russian girl has the ugliest jump technique I’ve ever seen,” Zuko explains uncharitably. “And she’s fifteen.”

“Low PCS?” Katara guesses. Program Components Scores – the ‘artistry score,’ essentially – are usually lower for younger skaters whose artistic sensibilities aren’t as developed yet.

“Yeah. Usually those kinds of skaters have no competition, but Azula…” Zuko sighs, unsure whether to be proud or envious. “She’s pretty much unbeatable. Doesn’t even need quads, even though she’s training them.”

“I’ve seen.” Katara is slightly afraid of Azula as is and watching her train quadruple toe loops – a jump almost no one in the ladies’ field is attempting, though they’re extremely common for men – hasn’t helped with that. “So, who else should I be watching?”

(Of course, Katara already knows the answer to that question, but Zuko is proving himself to be surprisingly knowledgeable about ladies’ skating, and she likes watching him talk when he forgets that he’s supposed to be awkward.)

He gives her a funny sideways look. “I’m pretty sure you already know that.”

_Guilty as charged,_ her sheepish smile seems to say. “Well, yeah, but I like hearing you talk about it. You obviously know a lot.”

“Yeah. That’s what I get for living with Azula.” Mercifully, the true weight of her compliment is entirely lost on him. “She analyzes her competition within an inch of their lives. I couldn’t not pick up on some stuff even if I wanted to.”

“That sounds like Azula.” Katara doesn’t know Zuko’s sister all that well, since she refuses to speak to her most days, but it certainly seems to be in character. “You live together, right?”

He nods. “She probably wishes she lived alone, or at least shared an apartment with another skater or something. But she’s only seventeen and it isn’t like she has an income, so she kind of can’t.”

“So it’s you, her, and your uncle?”

He nods. “She stays up in her room like a hermit most of the time.”

“Again, that sounds pretty in-character for her.”

“It’s either that or she’s at the gym.”

“Wow, absolutely _nothing_ you’re saying is surprising.” Katara isn’t sure whether she wants to laugh or roll her eyes or both. “Why does she skate for Japan if you skate for Canada, though?”

He shifts a little bit uncomfortably in his seat. “Well, we lived in Japan until I was thirteen. You knew that, right?”

“Well, I knew you were from Japan, yeah, but I didn’t know it had been that long.” Katara doesn’t think she should press – he hasn’t told her much about his childhood even though they’ve been skating together for months now, and she decided long ago to let him share at his own pace.

“Yeah. That’s where we started skating. My uncle got us into it because he was a coach. Well, actually, he was a choreographer first – he was a dancer when he was young and he was a ballet instructor after that, so he’d work with skaters who wanted to improve their…carriage and stuff. That turned into choreography, and soon he was coaching, too.”

“With no skating experience?” Katara raises her eyebrows. “Impressive.”

“Yeah, it is.” She doesn’t miss the subtle flush of pride on her partner’s face and she smiles; it’s always so clear when she brings up Iroh that Zuko adores his uncle. “Anyways. We had…a rough home life, so he started bringing Azula and I to the rink he coached at to get us out of the house. I stuck with it because it was better than nothing, but Azula was actually good. Like… _good-_ good. So she started rising through the ranks really fast and by the time we moved away, she was so established in Japan that she didn’t think she needed to switch.”

“Even though it’s, like, twenty times more competitive for ladies skaters here than in Canada?” Katara raises her eyebrows. “I mean, she obviously doesn’t need any help, but that’s still gutsy.”

“Well, that’s Azula for you.” Now it’s Zuko’s turn to shrug. “I guess she didn’t see the need to be the best player on a losing team when she could be on a winning team and still outscore everyone.”

“I mean, I can’t blame her.” Katara doesn’t exactly share Azula’s…well, _killer instinct_ seems to be a good way to put it, but she understands the competitive fire that drives her to push herself further than she should all too well.

“Anyways, she was only eleven when we moved,” Zuko continues. “But she was getting international assignments at those Advanced Novice events that they don’t really do back at home, and even then she knew that she didn’t need an easier field to win. So she just…didn’t.”

“And six years later, she’s still winning everything,” Katara observes dryly.

“Yup.”

They’re silent for a moment as they watch the skaters, who’ve mostly now moved into jump run-throughs, practice. A girl who can’t be more than a sophomore in high school, impossible to miss in a turquoise Team Kazhakstan jacket, runs through her short program, and soft classical music lulls them both into a kind of trance as they absentmindedly watch her. Her program ends, though, and it feels like it’s time to break the silence.

“Have you always done ice dance, or did you start off in singles?” she asks. None of her research on Zuko, pre-partnership, revealed anything about his career before he started skating with Jun at fourteen, so she’s been curious for a while. “I mean, since ice dance isn’t really much of a thing in Japan?”

“No, I started in singles, but that didn’t last very long.” He winces, though it’s obviously not the reaction he wants her to see. “I didn’t have my sister’s athletic talent. So…let’s just say I was a slow learner.”

“Jumps, you mean?”

“Yeah. I think we realized when I was thirteen and still couldn’t land a triple lutz that I was never going to make it very far in singles.”

“That’s…still pretty far.” Katara glances up at him, eyes full of questions. “I switched to dance when I was seven and I’d just gotten my double salchow, so that’s a lot more than you can say for me.”

“Well, yeah, but I wasn’t anywhere near stacking up with the rest of the junior guys in Japan. Iroh switched me over because that way he could coach me, and I guess he thought I had potential or something.”

“You did.”

“That’s…highly debatable.” Zuko’s cheeks are tinged with pink and Katara isn’t sure if it’s the cold or the compliment to blame. “Anyway. I’m pretty new.”

“And you’ve gone through five partners in eight years?”

Zuko sighs heavily. “Anger issues. Teenage Zuko was…” he searches for a properly scathing word. “…difficult.”

Okay, so it’s not particularly scathing, but it’s accurate, and he somehow doesn’t feel like Katara would be the type to react well to the string of vulgarities he wants to unleash every time he thinks about his high school self.

“So you…scared them off?” Katara seems to find the prospect amusing. “You’re really not that intimidating.”

“Gee, thanks.”

“No, it’s not a bad thing. I mean, you don’t _want_ to scare people, do you?”

“Azula says that fear is the only reliable way to ensure that you’re respected.”

“Azula is seventeen and I’m pretty sure she has…” Katara narrows her eyes, trying to remember a word. “What’s the word for, like, a death wish, but for other people instead of yourself?”

“I don’t think there is one.” Zuko pauses to consider. “A murder-wish? Kill-wish? I don’t think that’s a thing.”

“Homicidal!” Katara says a little too loudly, drawing the worried eyes of several of the fans who’ve bought that obscenely expensive ticket pack that lets them sit in on the practice sessions. “I’m pretty sure she’s homicidal. So…not sure you should be taking all of your philosophies on life from her.”

“I’m not.” Privately, Zuko is embarrassingly pleased that Katara finds him approachable, because he’s never exactly been called that before and it’s refreshing, exciting, and…well, it makes him think he might really be turning over a new leaf. But he’s also a _little_ disappointed, if he’s honest with himself. “I was, um. Trying to make a joke.”

Katara’s face falls and he wonders why she’s upset. “Oh. Sorry. I didn’t-“

“Nah, don’t worry about it. Humor isn’t exactly my strength.”

“I could tell.” Katara hides an undignified snort-laugh behind her hand and has to take a minute to laugh it out before she speaks again. “Sorry, it’s just…you’re way funnier than you realize. Like, unintentionally. It’s adorable.”

“I’m not _adorable.”_ He tries to glower but he’s pretty sure the way his heart is racing is written all over his face. “I’m _terrifying._ Absolutely _menacing._ Not to be trifled with-“

“Oh, okay, mister former-English-major.”

“Shut up.” He slouches, crossing his arms over his chest with a peevish expression that isn’t entirely genuine. Katara elbows his side, though, and he can’t help but smile, if only a little bit.

“So did you actually bring me here to watch the practice, or did you just want to hang out?” Katara asks after a moment, when the buzzy, hazy elation of the moment has passed. “Because we’ve missed, like, four run throughs.”

“Both.” Zuko shrugs, trying not to give away too much. “I mean, yeah, I like to be here when Azula practices. But…I thought it would be nice if I did that _with_ someone.”

“I’m glad you asked, then.” Katara pushes a strand of hair behind her ear, ducking her face away from him as she does. “It’s…nice. Having someone to talk to.”

“You seem like the type who’d have plenty of people to talk to.”

Katara inhales sharply before she looks up. “You’d be surprised.”

  
He doesn’t ask what that means; they turn their eyes back to the ice and watch as Mai – also assigned here, as the top Japanese skaters usually are – nearly collides with the tiny Kazakh skater.

There’s not much to say after that.

* * *

**_NHK Trophy_ **

**_Short Dance_ **

****

One thing that Katara is quickly learning about skating in Japan: no one is exaggerating when they claim that fans there are the best in the world.

  
The Japanese figure skating fanbase is massive, enthusiastic, and incredibly knowledgeable, probably owing at least partly to the country’s phenomenal depth of talent in the singles fields; they turn out in the kind of droves Katara never sees at the Canadian competitions she usually attends. At least a few audience members bring flags for nearly every country which has a competitor, and the ice is swamped with toss gifts – things thrown on the ice at the end of a skater’s program, usually stuffed animals and flowers – after the biggest names skate.

Even in ice dance, a discipline in which Japan has virtually no competitors.

Even for a team that almost no one has ever heard of.

“This is nuts,” she whispers as she and Zuko take the ice to applause entire disproportionate to their popularity (and chances of winning, to be entirely fair), and he squeezes her hand in reply by way of a response.

He seems happier than usual, even – since the two Japanese dance teams sent to this event are not particularly likely to perform well, he’s about as close to a hometown skater with a shot at the top five as this event is going to see. She thought he’d have been stressed, being back in the country of his birth when the amorphous, undefined shadow of some undefined past here clearly still follows him. But he isn’t – Zuko almost seems light.

He _almost_ does away with the ever-present stiffness in his knees. And he’s _almost_ smiling, flushed and panting as he is, when he takes her arm to dip her across his knee in their closing pose.

And Katara can’t help it – she pumps her fist when he pulls her back onto her feet and into his arms. Because it’s been six months and they have a million miles to go but this is what she’s wanted to feel in the long, cold months since she first stepped back onto the ice.

* * *

**_Three Days Later_ **

**_  
Gala Practice_ **

****

_Fourth place._

Zuko can’t say or hear or read the words without a little bit of disbelief. _Fourth place –_ how did that even _happen?_ True, they’re twenty points off the podium (the competition among the top three was fierce but the rest of the field didn’t have the slightest chance of catching up), but… _fourth._ It’s almost unfathomable.

And now they’ve been asked to skate in a gala, for which they are entirely unprepared. To the point of choreographing the exhibition program they don’t have on the practice session three hours before the doors open.

It’s not without good reason that they aren’t prepared. Galas are meant to let the top performers – always the medalists, and sometimes a few of the runners-up if the field is big enough to allow for it – show off, have fun in a non-competitive setting with programs that they wouldn’t skate anywhere else; they’d never expected to place well enough to be invited to skate in one. Choreographing a program for one seemed like a waste of time when there was so much work to be done on their competitive programs, but now they’re in a gala for which they don’t have a program, and Katara, never one to shy from a challenge, decided that if they didn’t have one, they’d just have to come up with one in the space of a day.

In other news, if Zuko hears the chorus of _Feeling Good_ one single more time, he’s going to scream.

In other-other news, Katara is proving herself to be as good at choreography as she is at everything else. And by the time they take the ice for the gala, he in his short dance costume because he has nothing else to wear and she in a sheer black dress she’d borrowed from Suki (third place, ladies’, unsurprisingly – she knew she’d need a gala program and she, unlike Katara, has a costume for it), she knows exactly what she is doing.

He doesn’t, but it’s surprisingly hard to be awkward when Nina Simone’s heady vocals fill a rink that’s gone dead-silent and Katara’s…smoldering? He’s not really sure what the look on her face is called but it’s hard not to be caught up in his shaky memorization of her choreography when her hands skirt down his sides and she looks at him like she’s _trying_ to make him combust.

He barely even knows to wonder why she’d chosen such textbook Sexy Ice Dance Music. It’s for show, but he doesn’t have to try to pretend that it works; he stumbles, he forgets steps, but he isn’t acting when he meets her smolder with molten gold. And by the time they end the program to applause that’s far less polite than he’d have expected, and she’s leaning into him on one toe pick with her other leg wrapped around his thigh and her hand pressed to his chest, he’s not thinking straight.

He wonders, somewhat dazedly, if Katara knows that she’s been seducing him without realizing it. And then he remembers that this is all an act and he bites his lip so hard it nearly bleeds to keep the color from rising in his cheeks as she looks up at him and smiles, taking his hand and unhooking her leg before they turn out to the audience.

“Not bad for a program we’ve only had for a day,” she teases.

“Mmph.”

  
Zuko knows three languages and remembers how to speak none of them right now.

* * *

**_Last Night in Tokyo_ **

“Come on, take my picture!” Katara insists, her voice carrying over the sound of the crowd but only just. Pedestrians swirl around her, a school of fish that parts around her but, again, only just. And she stands on the center line of the crosswalk, her white beanie threatening to fall off and her smile radiant.

It’s nighttime but if the lights of downtown Tokyo weren’t enough to illuminate her, that smile would be.

“It isn’t going to come out,” Zuko calls to her, though he isn’t sure if she’ll hear him. Nevertheless, he takes the picture and several backups, just in case. There’s almost no way she’ll be visible in the crowd, especially with the poor lighting, but if she wants the picture, she’s going to get one.

He hasn’t been to Shibuya since he was a child, and he doesn’t have particularly fond memories of the place. So Katara’s wonder is mystifying to him. He doesn’t know why this hectic street crossing fascinates her the way it does, unless it’s merely because it’s iconic – and he doubts that, because Katara is hardly the kind of girl to love something because somebody else says she should. But she’d thrust her phone into his hands and run (as much as she could run through the ever-present, ever-moving crowd of pedestrians using the Shibuya Crossing), stopping about a third of the way down the crossing and posing there.

So he takes her picture, of course, because he cannot imagine _not_ doing anything she asks of him. And she’s running back to him when his thumbs-up lets her know that he’s taken the photo, her smile still threatening to blow a fuse somewhere.

“I thought I was going to get trampled the whole time!” she cries, utterly delighted. Under the lights, she grabs his arm and takes off running, not really knowing where; passersby turn to stare as they nearly collide with everyone they pass. Finally, she ducks under the awning of what looks to be a bakery, panting and laughing and flushed.

“What are we doing, Katara?” Zuko finally asks when she’s caught her breath.

“I don’t know.” She shrugs, still chipper. “But it’s great, right?”

“Yeah.” He nods in spite of his reservations (he doesn’t even know what that _means)._ “Yeah, it is.”


	4. Uncool Buddies

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ah, the chaotic filler chapter. 
> 
> In other words, if that meme doesn't embed I will SOB. MY EYES OUT.
> 
> Okay. Meme embedded. Tbh I’ve had a hankering to write something funny lately - like, not “that’s a witty one liner!” funny, _side-splitting_ funny. And I need motivation to get a move on this massive, massive fic. So I’m allowing myself free reign with this to attempt as much comedy as I wish (key word: *attempt*), so long as the plot keeps going. Enter at your own risk. :p

**_December 18_ **

**_Supposed to Be a Practice Day_ **

****

“Someone’s in a bad mood.”

  
Sokka looks up from his phone with a peevish grunt of displeasure. “Aren’t you supposed to be at practice right now?”

Katara takes a seat beside him on the ratty couch they’d found cheap at a thrift store and dragged up the stairs and through their apartment’s tiny door themselves. “Nope. The roads are bad, so Iroh told me to stay home.”

“Huh. Guess that means they’ll probably cancel practice,” he says, and his sour expression grows even more disgruntled. “Great. Of all the days to get hit by the sixth ‘storm of the century’ this decade…”

“Big game coming up?” Katara inches closer to him, trying to peer over her brother’s shoulder at whatever’s on his phone. He swats her away.

“No.”

He doesn’t elaborate, but she intends to make him go on whether he wants to or not. “Hm. Then why does it matter if you miss practice?”

“Because I don’t _want_ to.”

“But _why” –_ Katara freezes, and her face breaks into a grin when she remembers what time his Thursday practice sessions are. “ _Oooh._ Because _your_ practices on Thursdays are right before _Suki’s.”_

“Shut up,” he mutters, his face growing redder than it needs to.

“You’re not denying it, though.”

“I like her, okay? You clearly already knew that. What’s the big deal?”

“Aww, someone has a _crush,”_ she singsongs, as if they’re twelve and fourteen again. She’s been doing this forever - Sokka has a long, storied history of crushing on her training mates. For most of his teenage years it was Yue Ayuluk, a singles skater, who’d been a close friend of Katara’s at the rink she trained at in high school, and she’s never quite let him hear the end of it. He’d had to move on, of course, because Yue had retired young after about a thousand injuries and a fall from favor with the Federation and gone off to college in Switzerland, but Sokka hadn’t been quick to move on – this is the first serious interest he’s shown in a girl since. The fact that she has no idea how it even happened notwithstanding, Katara isn’t about to let that bear go unpoked.

“So what? You spend half of your time making bedroom eyes at your stupid partner.”

(This is an obvious exaggeration of his distaste, as Sokka recently decided that it is his mission in life to make a rather skeptical and entirely unreceptive Zuko his bro.)

Katara rolls her eyes, kicking her feet up on the armrest because this couch was full of dust when they bought it and it hasn’t gotten any better no matter how many times she vacuums it, so she might as well. “First of all, I do not make ‘bedroom eyes’ at Zuko, and second of all, even if I _did-“_

“Which you _do._ Don’t think I didn’t see that NHK Gala.”

“-it would be _fake,_ because it’s my _job_ to pretend to be…different things to him. Including, apparently, someone who really, _really_ wants to-“

“Katara, I am _begging_ you not to finish that sentence.”

“I don’t even need to. You know what I was going to say.”

“I hate you.”

“I know.” She quiet enjoys the schadenfreude of making him squirm when she’s been subjected to endless stories of the bad dates he’s been on in an effort to forget about Yue over the years. “Anyways. You and Suki, huh?”

  
“Well, technically, there _is_ no ‘me and Suki,’ but…” Sokka shrugs. “Maybe there will be? Eventually?”

“Seriously, though Suki’s great. I’m all for it.” Katara glances over at Sokka to see if he’s still texting – he is, and he’s smiling down at his phone as he types, which she assumes means he’s talking to Suki. “But how did it even _happen?”_

Sokka looks up from his phone as if he’s surprised to hear her speak and then looks down again, his expression sheepish. “Well, um. Obviously the singles practice sessions aren’t always at the same time as yours, so I couldn’t just use picking you up as an excuse to stick around after my practices ended. So…”

“Yes…?”

Sokka winces. “I may or may not have told Suki that we were too broke to pay for internet access and I had to do my schoolwork at the rink because the lobby has free wi-fi.”

“ _Sokka!”_

“I know, I _know,_ but…Katara, I _like_ her. What else was I supposed to do when Azula started interrogating me about why I was always hanging around during her practices?”

Katara’s still not convinced that blatantly lying is the best policy when it comes to looking for love, but under the stress of an Azula Nishimura interrogation, she can understand why he’d have blurted out the first excuse he could think of.

  
“Well, if you ever bring her over, she’s going to know,” Katara points out, approaching from the pragmatic angle as she tends to do. “That we have internet, I mean.”

Sokka squints, considering, and when he opens his eyes all the way again he’s wearing his lost-in-thought expression. “Y’know, we’d actually save a lot of money if we stopped paying for wi-fi…”

“Sokka, we can’t both be doing all of our homework at the rink.” Katara sits up and turns to face him, arms and legs crossed. “How are you going to write an entire senior thesis in the lobby of an ice rink with wi-fi slower than your brain before coffee and a janitor who’s always glaring at you for taking up one of the tables for too long?” She shakes her head. “And how’s that going to work when it’s eleven P.M. the night before a paper is due, the rink is closed, and you still haven’t written it?”

“I wasn’t _serious,”_ he mutters, even though he absolutely was. “I mean, we _are_ kinda broke, and I _do_ save money by using the lights and internet at the rink instead of here. And Suki always comes by after practice to chat and one time she told me about this coffee shop that has better free wi-fi than the rink and sorta invited me to come study there with her and she’s so _funny_ and-“

“Wait, she asked you out?” Katara’s eyes widen with excitement. “Why didn’t you _tell_ me that?”

“She didn’t ask me out, Katara. She offered to study with me.”

“…dude.”

“ _What?”_

Katara arches an eyebrow, still impeccably-sculpted from the threading it underwent before NHK, at him. “You are _ridiculously_ dense.”

“Okay, so the thought that she was asking me out _might_ have crossed my mind,” Sokka admits, “but…I didn’t want to get my hopes up.”

“Okay, but she _was_ asking you out. Like, there is _no_ way a girl you don’t go to school with would ask you to study with her if she didn’t want an excuse to spend time alone with you. Just saying.” Katara pauses for a moment. “Wait, _does_ she go to Caldera Tech?”

  
Sokka shakes his head. “No, online classes. From a university in Japan.”

“Hm. Yup, definitely a date.” If Suki were an in-person student at the nearby Caldera Polytechnic University, as Sokka (a fourth-year engineering student) and Katara (a second-year nursing student) are, the offer might’ve made sense – they could’ve shared a class. But she isn’t and now Katara’s interest is decidedly piqued. “What’d you say?”

“ _Obviously_ I said yes.”

  
“Considering that you were so firmly in denial about this even being a date to begin with, I’m shocked that you think that’s obvious.”

“Katara, as I keep saying, I _like_ her, and we don’t exactly have a ton of excuses to hang out. Of _course_ I said yes.”

“But you’ve been texting nonstop, right?” Katara peeks over Sokka’s shoulder at his phone again and, for the second time, he swats her away.

  
“Not _nonstop.”_

“But…regularly?”

“Well, yeah…”

“Did you ask for her number or did she ask for yours?”

“Um. I think I did?”

“So she has cause to believe that you like her.” Katara taps her fingers against her forearm. “And she asked you to spend time together in person outside of the rink, completely unprompted.”

“I mean…yeah?”

“She definitely likes you.”

Sokka squints again, as if sizing her up. “Who died and made _you_ some kind of love expert?”

“I’m not, but I’m a girl her age who knows what to look for.” Katara crosses her arms in a _try-me_ sort of gesture. “So yeah, it’s a date.”

“Huh.” He can’t help but smile. “Cool.”

“How did this even _happen?”_ Katara asks, now that that’s all cleared up. “I mean…Suki is constantly busy. How’d you two get so close so quickly?”

“You underestimate how many papers I’ve written in the lobby while she practices.” Sokka smiles as if he’s letting her in on some grand secret, leaning towards her with a hand shielding his mouth. “ _Almost all of them_. And guess who always comes over to talk to me after practice? And texts me later? And laughs at the hockey puns you tell me are so awful?”

“…so you’re sitting there writing papers and hoping the ‘stare at her until she agrees to marry you’ approach works?” Katara crosses her arms. “Huh. You and Zuko have more in common than I thought you did. Maybe this whole ‘bros’ thing isn’t that far-fetched.”

“…I am not _staring at her until she agrees to marry me_ , Katara. I’m _multitasking flirtatiously_ and it’s _working.”_

“And how many classes are you failing?”

“ _None,_ if you must know.”

“Huh. Surprising, given that I’d expect you spend more time watching her skate than you do…you know, actually working.”

“Well, yeah, but I’m doing fine, and besides, I’m a _student athlete,”_ Sokka replies. “No one expects me to have more than six brain cells or to use more than three of them at once. I’m already a standout if I don’t have any C’s.”

“Sokka, you’re the smartest person I know. Don’t give me that ‘student athlete’ crap.” Katara rolls her eyes, all too familiar with the way Sokka exploits his spot on Caldera Tech’s hockey team to explain away any lapses in academic performance he might fall into. He’s brilliant when it comes to physics and calculus and problem-solving, and about as far from the collegiate-athlete stereotype that it gets in that area – but that doesn’t stop him from using the excuse when he sees the need to.

He nods, surprisingly serious given the lighthearted tone he’d been using a moment ago. “I know, Katara. I wouldn’t be doing this if it meant that my GPA was gonna take a nosedive.”

“Well, as unfounded as it might be in some areas, I trust you in this one,” Katara sighs. “And I like Suki, which doesn’t hurt. But I still think there are better ways to flirt than lying about being too broke to pay your utilities bill and then lurking in the freezing lobby after practice in the hopes that she’ll talk to you.”

“Well, she asked me out, didn’t she?” Sokka asks defiantly. “I think that speaks for itself.”

  
“Sure.” She pats his shoulder as she gets up, rolling her eyes fondly. “Whatever you want to tell yourself.”

  
“At least I’m not stuck in a permanent state of _yearning,”_ he shoots back, and Katara turns in the doorway with an indignant pout. “Honestly, if you two keep pining like this, you’ll be in a Christmas tree lot by next year.”

  
“…did you really just imply that I’m pining for my ice dance partner just to make a tree pun?”

“I mean, I mostly implied it because it’s _true,_ but the tree pun didn’t hurt.”

“Well, it hurt my _soul,”_ Katara huffs. “That was awful.”

“One day you’ll recognize my brilliance, little sister!” he calls from the couch as she retreats down the ten-foot hallway into her own bedroom. “Just you wait!”

Katara rolls her eyes as she flops back down against her comforter and absentmindedly flicks through the notifications on her phone’s lock screen. Sokka has been her best friend nearly all her life, but that won’t stop her from readily admitting that he is absolutely, unrepentantly _ridiculous_ sometimes.

She hopes he never attempts one of his trademark puns around Suki if he likes her as much as he claims to, but she isn’t going to hold her breath on it.

******

**_The Same Morning_ **

**_[9:12 A.M.]_ **

**_Katara:_ ** _hey, you up?_

**_[9:13 A.M.]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _…_

 **_Zuko:_ ** _…bold of you to assume I know how to sleep in_

 **_Zuko:_ ** _(to answer your question, no)_

**_[9:13 A.M.]_ **

**_Katara:_ ** _sfhwghsoigh you’re not wrong_

 **_Katara:_ ** _imagine sleeping past 6_

**_[9:13 A.M.]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _pls tell me you aren’t one of those keysmash texters_

**_[9:14 A.M.]_ **

**_Katara:_ ** _sdifhghoigh whyyyyy_

 **_Katara:_ ** _you got a problem with that?_

**_[9:14 A.M.]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _…never mind._

****

**_[9:14 A.M.]_ **

**_Katara:_ ** _oh hello Mr. Ex-English-Major_

**_[9:15 A.M.]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _???_

**_[9:15 A.M.]_ **

**_Katara:_ ** _bc you punctuated a text?_

 **_Katara:_ ** _sorry that was weird_

**_[9:16 A.M.]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _it’s really not that weird._

**_[9:16 A.M.]_ **

**_Katara:_ ** _you doing that or me pointing it out?_

**_[9:16 A.M.]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _SEE? You did it too! It’s not weird_

**_[9:16 A.M.]_ **

**_Katara:_ ** _yeah bc periods at the end of sentences are implied but question marks aren’t…duh_

**_[9:17 A.M.]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _um anyways why’d you ask if I was up?_

**_[9:17 A.M.]_ **

**_Katara:_ ** _oh right_

 **_Katara:_ ** _bc my brother made the worst pun this morning_

 **_Katara:_ ** _and it was kinda about us_

_Katara: wanna hear it?_

**_[9:18 A.M.]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _I’m really not sure that I do_

**_[9:18 A.M.]_ **

**_Katara:_ ** _well too bad_

 **_Katara:_ ** _you’re gonna_

 **_Katara:_ ** _but first context_

 **_Katara:_ ** _so he has this massive crush on Suki right?_

**_[9:19 A.M.]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _Tsumura?_

**_[9:19 A.M.]_ **

**_Katara:_ ** _do we *know* another Suki?_

**_[9:20 A.M.]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _idk man I wouldn’t be that surprised_

**_[9:20 A.M.]_ **

**_Katara:_ ** _yes, Suki Tsumura_

 **_Katara:_ ** _anyways he has this massive crush on her and he was all mad this morning bc if our practice got cancelled his prob would too and he couldn’t go lurk in the lobby and talk to her_

**_[9:21 A.M.]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _is that why he’s always at Azula’s practices?_

**_[9:21 A.M.]_ **

**_Katara:_ ** _yeah, apparently they hit it off and he told her we didn’t have internet at home so he’d have an excuse to do his hw there_

 **_Katara:_ ** _little weird ngl but I mean…if she’s comfortable with it idc_

 **_Katara:_ ** _but anyways_

 **_Katara:_ ** _she kinda asked him out and he didn’t realize it was a date_

 **_Katara:_ ** _so naturally I was mocking him_

**_[9:21 A.M.]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _do you always send 86 texts when you could send 2?_

**_[9:22 A.M.]_ **

**_Katara:_ ** _smh so judgmental_

**_[9:22 A.M.]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _smh no one says smh anymore_

****

**_[9:22 A.M.]_ **

**_Katara:_ ** _yeah but you just did_

 **_Katara:_ ** _therefore we are both uncool_

**_[9:24 A.M.]_ **

**_Katara:_ **

**_Katara:_ ** _:)_

**_[9:24 A.M.]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _did you just…_

 **_Zuko:_ ** _did you just make that_

**_[9:25 A.M.]_ **

**_Katara:_ ** _well yes obviously_

**_[9:25 A.M.]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _you…are so weird_

**_[9:26 A.M.]_ **

**_Katara:_ ** _a badge of shame that I wear with pride :)_

**_[9:26 A.M.]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _anyways. Suki?_

**_[9:27 A.M.]_ **

**_Katara:_ ** _o yeah sorry bout that_

 **_Katara:_ ** _anyway_

 **_Katara:_ ** _I was mocking him bc for someone with as much game as he has_

 **_Katara:_ ** _(and if you ever tell anyone I said that I will impale you with my skate)_

**_[9:27 A.M.]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _um that seems a bit excessive_

**_[9:27 A.M.]_ **

**_Katara:_ ** _nope strictly necessary_

 **_Katara:_ ** _anyways_

 **_Katara:_ ** _for someone with as much game as he has, Sokka SUCKS at flirting_

 **_Katara:_ ** _so naturally I was mocking him_

 **_Katara:_ ** _and he decided to fight back_

 **_Katara:_ ** _by teasing me about you_

 **_Katara:_ ** _bc he has this crazy idea that we have a ~thing~ going on_

**_[9:28 A.M.]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _a…~thing~?_

**_[9:28 A.M.]_ **

**_Katara:_ ** _p sure he thinks we’re secretly making out in the locker room between practices_

**_[9:28 A.M.]_ **

**_Zuko_ ** _is typing_

**_[9:29 A.M.]_ **

**_Zuko_ ** _is typing_

**_[9:30 A.M.]_ **

**_Zuko_ ** _is typing_

**_[9:31 A.M.]_ **

**_Zuko_ ** _is typing_

**_[9:32 A.M.]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _lol wut_

**_[9:33 A.M.]_ **

**_Katara:_ ** _I will never understand why it took you four minutes to type six letters and a space but uh_

 **_Katara:_ ** _aaaaanyways_

 **_Katara:_ ** _he thought it would be a genius idea to get back at me by referring to this thing we don’t have_

 **_Katara:_ ** _so he said that no matter how bad his flirting skills were_

 **_Katara:_ ** _at least he wasn’t_

 **_Katara:_ ** _and I quote_

 **_Katara:_ ** _“pining so hard he’d end up in a Christmas tree lot by next year” like we were_

****

**_[9:34 A.M.]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _…_

 **_Zuko:_ ** _why???_

**_[9:34 A.M.]_ **

**_Katara:_ ** _bc as smart as my brother is_

 **_Katara:_ ** _he is a dumb***_

**_[9:35 A.M.]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _did you just…censor yourself…?_

**_[9:36 A.M.]_ **

**_Katara:_ ** _SHUT UP OK_

**_[9:37 A.M.]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _you’re a weird one, Nutaraq_

**_[9:38 A.M.]_ **

**_Katara:_ **

**_Katara:_ ** _:)_

**_[9:39 A.M.]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _don’t you have homework?_

**_[9:40 A.M.]_ **

**_Katara:_ ** _we’re on winter break…_

 **_Katara:_ ** _Zuko, you knew that_

**_[9:40 A.M.]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _worth a shot_

**_[9:41 A.M.]_ **

**_Katara:_ ** _oh shush_

 **_Katara:_ ** _if you weren’t texting me you’d be watching daytime soaps with Iroh and you know it_

**_[9:42 A.M.]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _yeah but_

 **_Zuko:_ ** _Days of Our Lives is looking more and more appealing every minute_

**_[9:43 A.M.]_ **

**_Katara:_ ** _smh_

 **_Katara:_ ** _lies_

**_[9:43 A.M.]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _can’t believe I’m saying this but I might actually go do extra ab conditioning_

**_[9:44 A.M.]_ **

**_Katara:_ ** _bc you want to woo me with washboard abs?_

 **_Katara:_ ** _pro tip: I prefer a refined sense of humor_

 **_Katara:_ ** _if you ever want to make it out of the Christmas tree lot_

**_[9:45 A.M.]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _yk who I’m trying to woo?_

 **_Zuko:_ ** _the judge who gave us a 6.5 for skating skills at SA_

 **_Zuko:_ ** _never again_

**_[9:46 A.M.]_ **

**_Katara:_ ** _omg I’m rubbing off on you! Proud_

 **_Katara:_ ** _maybe I need to annoy you more often…_

**_[9:47 A.M.]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _I can’t believe I’m saying this but_

 **_Zuko:_ ** _if it gets me to fix my posture_

 **_Zuko:_ ** _pls do_

**_[9:48 A.M.]_ **

**_Katara:_ ** _your posture._

 **_Katara:_ ** _riiiight._

_[Read: 9:48 A.M.]_

_**_

**_December 31_ **

**_Practice – This Time Not On a Snow Day_ **

****

This is not difficult.

  
This is not more difficult than those godforsaken sit-spin twizzles Katara’s old coach used to make her teams practice because “it’s good to keep things fresh” (it was not). This is not more difficult than hitting all of one’s key points. This is not more difficult than holding up her dress for three minutes of a program when the clasp holding up the bodice had snapped mid-program at Nationals when she was fourteen, her first season at the junior level. This is _certainly_ not more difficult than pushing through the grueling ab workouts Zuko keeps sending her because he apparently thinks that leaving her on read and reemerging from the depths of her phone an hour later to declare that “everything hurts and I’m dying” constitutes an inside joke. (She’d be lying if she says it doesn’t make her smile, but the workouts themselves most certainly _don’t_ and she’ll die before she admits that they’re miserable.)

This is _not difficult._

But Katara’s traitorous brain doesn’t want to admit that. It would rather pretend that even the slightest variation on the lifts she and Zuko have been training for months is _the absolute end of the world as she knows it,_ and though her legs haven’t felt so shaky in months, she can’t seem to stay steady now.

It’s no secret that lifts aren’t exactly their strength. Katara’s terrified of them no matter how hard she tries to tamp down her fear, and Zuko is terrified of terrifying her so much that she’ll never let him lift her again, so they tend to stick to easier ones than most of their competitors. Katara likes to think that they make up for it in other ways, but she knows that this temporary respite from the kind of acrobatics the competition is attempting – the kind she’d been eager to attempt before the Incident – isn’t going to last.

This two-month break between the Grand Prix’s end in November and Nationals at the end of January is a golden opportunity to start training more difficult lifts, according to Iroh. And as much as Katara pretends to be game for it, she is most definitely not.

  
“It’s not that different than what we practiced,” Zuko tries to reassure her as she stands with both feet planted on his thighs. They’re almost perfectly flat as he bends at the waist and she can balance this way without issue, especially on ground in her running shoes, as she’s doing now. “You just need to help me get enough-“

“Momentum to swing me over,” Katara repeats, taking a deep breath that accomplishes absolutely nothing. She wishes, not for the first time, that Iroh were here to spot this lift, but he’s done that enough times that he’s confident that she can pull it off without assistance and he’s taken off the training wheels, stepping out to talk to the rink manager and instructing them to try it a few times on their own while he’s gone. “Got it.”

He can’t really look up at her when his eyes are at waist height, but it seems like he’s trying to. “I’ve got you, okay?”

“I know.” She _does_ know, but it isn’t as reassuring as it should be.

“You don’t sound convinced.”

“Zuko, please just try this before your knees give out.” Squatting in a plié, and with Katara’s full weight balanced on his thighs, it’s a legitimate concern no matter how strong his legs are.

“Katara, I’m _not_ going to drop you.”

“I know you aren’t. I just…”

He waits a beat for her to finish her sentence, and jumps in when she doesn’t. “Okay, step down.”

“Huh?”

“Step down,” Zuko repeats. “Like. The floor?”

“Oh, right.” Katara tries not to let him see how relieved she is to be on solid ground again when she carefully shifts her weight to step off of his thighs.

When she’s safely on the floor again, Zuko stands, hand against the metal railing by the skate rental counter that skaters often use as a makeshift barre for stretching. “I could feel you shaking,” he explains. “Wasn’t safe to keep trying.”

“I’m sorry.” Katara hadn’t known that she was trembling, but she still casts her eyes to the floor. “I didn’t-“

“You don’t have to make excuses, Katara.”

“But-“

“Don’t ‘but’ me.” He walks over to the benches where they usually take off their skates after practice and gestures for her to follow. “If you’re _shaking,_ I’m not going to try to throw you around my shoulders. That would be incredibly stupid.”

“But Iroh thought-“

“Iroh didn’t know it would freak you out this much.” This Zuko – the one patting the bench to invite Katara to sit, the one so worried about not only her safety but her comfort – is worlds away from the drily snarky one she’s been texting nonstop all of her break, and the thought warms her in a way that it really shouldn’t. “You were comfortable doing it with the spot, you’re not comfortable doing it without. Fine. We don’t _have_ to compete this lift at Nationals. We can wait. But if you try something you’re not comfortable with and freak yourself out mid-lift, we could be looking at a season-ending injury.”

“Right.” Katara’s mouth feels dry and she isn’t sure whether it’s because of the nerves or her disappointment that his reasons for stepping away are so…pragmatic. “Can’t be risking that.”

“I get the sense that you don’t believe me when I tell you that I’ve got you.” Katara isn’t looking at Zuko, but his eyes still search her face. “Is that just…residual? Because of your last partner?”

She nods. “I thought he had me and he didn’t, so I guess…trust issues?”

“That makes sense.” He reaches over to squeeze her shoulder; she’s surprised at the contact when he’s never stuck her as a touchy person off the ice, but not unpleasantly so. “I know we need to work on this, but we also have to be aware that you don’t dully trust me yet. Not safe to be trying things like this if we don’t know that we can trust each other, right?”

“Is this a pep talk or a psychoanalysis?”

“Uh…both?” Zuko shrugs. “Why, am I talking like my therapist again?”

“Little bit.” Katara’s always found it endearing the way counselor-speak makes its way into his everyday interactions. “But what you’re saying makes sense. I guess I’m just kind of stuck in that moment when I realized that I couldn’t trust my last partner, and…pushing too far sends me right back, you know?”

“Do you…” Zuko looks up at her questioningly, as if expecting her to know what he’s implying – she doesn’t. “Do you want to talk about it?”

“What’s there to talk about? You already know what happened.” Katara shrugs. “Would it help you to rehash it?”

“Well, yeah, I know the basics, but I’ve never heard _you_ talk about it.”

“All right.” Katara wipes her sweaty palms on her leggings. “So I skated with Jet for six years. You knew that, right?”

“I did.”

“We basically grew up together. Dated on and off, that sort of thing.” Katara grimaces. “We were kinda the classic tabloids-worthy ice dance team. Anyway, the summer before last season, we knew we’d be trying to make a push for one of the Olympic spots, so we started upping our difficulty. Of course, some of that was just drilling our patterns and stuff, but a lot of our…improvements…involved trying new lift variations.” Her breath catches in her throat.

“You okay?”

Katara nods. “I’m fine. Anyways. There was this one that was always particularly tricky. He’d basically swing me out so that my boot skimmed the ice and use the momentum of that movement to swing me over his shoulder from behind, then I’d plant my feet on both of his thighs like we were doing earlier, except that I was facing him instead of the audience. Then I’d hook both my legs around his neck, he’d turn, I’d release one of my legs and swing it down over his head, he’d catch it, then the other would follow and I’d fall a few inches, face-down and sort of…out flat horizontally, before he caught me bridal-style and set me down.” She’s not quite sure how to describe the lift in question when she doesn’t even want to think about it, but she tries anyway. “Do you kinda get what that looked like?”

“Yeah.” Zuko grimaces. “Sounds awful.”

“It was, but I _loved_ that lift on the ground.” Her voice is almost wistful now. “I loved pushing myself – seeing how much more we could do. Until we had to start doing it on the ice.”

“Did you _ever_ land it right?”

  
Katara nods. “Twice, and I’ll never forget it. I guess we both thought we were invincible, and the third time, he was careless enough to forget that the first part of that lift was a super delicate balance between too much force and not enough. So he kind of ended up…” she winces. “Throwing me.”

“He _what?”_

“Got a little too excited. Put too much of his weight into the swing over his shoulder. The pacing of that lift was critical because he couldn’t get me all the way over his shoulder if it was too slow and I couldn’t get my footing or stay upright if it was too fast, so I kind of…fell backwards and took him down with me.”

“And you took the brunt of that fall?”

“Well, yes, but the real issue was that my head hit the ice.”

Zuko winces.

“I blacked out and woke up in the hospital to find myself in a neck brace and one of those full-arm casts to stabilize my shoulder, which was broken.” Now it’s Katara’s turn to wince. “And my ankle in a cast where he’d pinned it at a weird angle when he fell on me. And a concussion.”

“And you broke up with him because of that?” Zuko’s expression – he looks a little bit nauseous – makes it clear that he doesn’t blame her.

  
“No, _he_ broke up with _me_ because my _three broken bones_ weren’t healing fast enough and I was going to be out the entire Olympic season.” Katara shakes her head. “I was _eighteen.”_

“Permission to say somethign that’ll probably make you mad?” Zuko asks.

“Since when do you need my permission for that?”

Zuko shrugs. “I do have _some_ sense of decency. Anyways. Permission granted or not?”

“Granted,” Katara sighs. This ought to be good.

“He’s an idiot who had no idea what he was giving up.”

Katara’s cheeks flush. “I mean, he _was_ an idiot, but I don’t know about that last part.”

“But I do.” He looks up at her with all the shyness of a frightened baby deer – he almost looks like one, too, all expressive golden eyes and long, dark lashes. “And I can’t say that I’ll never drop you, because I’m also an idiot, but I’m not going to give up on you like that.”

“That’s…surprisingly sweet of you, Zuko.” Katara reaches over to squeeze Zuko’s shoulder as he had hers, figuring it’s an acceptable gesture since he’d done the same to her. “And it means a lot to me that you cared enough to ask me that question.”

“You’re my _partner,_ Katara. I can’t exactly work with you if I don’t know you.”

“Well, I suppose.” Again, Katara finds herself curiously disappointed by that answer. “Anyways. Do you want to try that again?”

“Are you sure you don’t want to wait for Iroh?” he asks. “There’s no reason we can’t take a stretch break or something.”

  
“No, I think I can do this.” _I need to prove to myself that I can,_ she doesn’t add. “As long as you’re on board with it.”

“Well, if you think we’ve got this, I’m not going to disagree,” Zuko acquiesces.

The mechanism of this lift is similar to the one she has such bad memories of: she begins with her feet planted on Zuko’s thighs, facing the audience, then turns on one blade so that he can throw her body over his shoulders and around his back until she reaches his front again and settles into a seated position on his hips. Then, she’ll swing one leg out and they’ll rotate before he uses the momentum of the spinning motion to set her down. But, though part of her quails at the idea of letting a partner throw her behind his back again, it doesn’t feel quite so treacherous as it always had with Jet. She feels…well, at very least, certain that Zuko is far too nervous to take things fast enough to throw her off. If anything, he’s more likely to be so slow that she won’t make it back around.

And somehow, knowing that he will take things slow makes all the difference in the world. 


	5. Shadows

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Suki, Azula, and Mai at the Japanese National Championships.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Christmas surprise update? 
> 
> No one asked for a side-characters chapter, but I couldn't resist digging into our three representatives of Team Japan here because, as a former singles skater, it's my jam and my thing and I LOVE writing about it. (See: the fact that my first published novel was - shocker - about three ladies singles' skaters.) So here ya go. If any of this story's tens of readers were sad that Taang and Ty Lee, our other side characters, didn't get a lot of screen-time in this one, I...might give them stuff later? There will def be Taang content, don't worry. 
> 
> Also...uh. I'm sorry, I could NOT resist that Hina reference. I'M SORRY I NEED TO STOP-

**_All-Japan Figure Skating Championships – Ladies Short Program_ **

**_Osaka, Japan_ **

**_December 24_ **

****

Azula Nishimura doesn’t bother to smile for the cameras when her name is called. It would be fake, utterly inauthentic, to pretend that she’s got any reason to: this program doesn’t call for it, this occasion doesn’t call for it, and this audience isn’t owed some painted-on performance grin. They’re there for _her,_ after all, not the other way around. Too many skaters, Azula has realized, are under the mistaken illusion that they’re here to entertain; she’s not fooled. She’s not a trained seal – she’s an elite athlete, here to show the judges why, exactly, she is a cut above the best in the world.

It’s a sort of paradox: she does not skate for those who watch her, but without an audience, and without judges, there would be nothing to prove, and with nothing to prove, there would be no reason to do what she does. But it doesn’t matter, really, so long as it works, and she tries not to think about it too much – she can’t save much space in her mind for philosophical matters when every drop of her mental energy drains into the reservoir of useful knowledge she’s built up.

Some of that knowledge is for her direct use: choreography and technique drilled into her muscle memory, which musical accents to emphasize when the Swedish judge who’s impossibly stingy with his Interpretation scores is on the judging panel, what went wrong in her last run-through and how not to let it happen again. But some of it isn’t as directly relevant – she knows her competitors’ strengths and weaknesses and histories inside and out, constantly studies them until she knows what it takes to win if they end up head-to-head. It’s what’s made her a four-time National Champion in one of the deepest fields in the world at seventeen – never mind that she wasn’t even old enough to skate at the senior level internationally when she won her first two titles – and it leaves no room for hesitation, nor for doubt. Either she maintains tunnel vision so flawless that she forgets how to use her peripherals, or it all crumbles.

And crumbling? That’s the last thing Azula Nishimura will ever do.

Smiling, then, would be an entirely unnecessary waste of priceless energy. She needs every second’s worth of strength she can get to stay afloat, and besides, a solid poker face does wonders for morale. Every girl in this building thinks she has one, but none compare to the featureless stoniness of Azula’s. None of the prepubescent Russian skaters who’ve lately become the bane of Azula’s existence (what are impressive jump combinations without polish, without refinement, without a true master’s eye for the tiniest detail?) can even match it, famed as they are for their mental toughness. Much as she runs from the idea that she is anything so crass as an _actress_ , Azula is alone at the top because her ability to control what other see of her is unparalleled. Every time she steps onto the ice, she creates an image of which this blank expression is as much a part as her flawless triple-triples.

Besides, if the uproar in the crowd when her name is called is any indication, she doesn’t _need_ to smile to win their appreciation. And even though she doesn’t care whether they like her or not when they are mere spectators, it _does_ feel good to be admired.

Agni knows she’ll never be admired like this anywhere else.

Appreciative or not, though, the audience’s welcome dies down at the haunting glockenspiel notes that open Alfred Schnittke’s _Agony Tango._ The melody is the kind of earworm that one wants desperately to be rid of but never can, an almost eerie, cloyingly desperate motif repeated over and over on different instruments. Though she’s never cared much about performance, Azula has always been picky about her music; this selection is one she’s particularly fond of. Its chilling melody commands attention for none of the usual reasons, and does not call for exaggerated expressions or balletic softness; its insistent bass line acts to ground her when her own efforts cannot; and its slow buildup from a single stark line of melody backed by snare drums to a fully-orchestrated explosion of sound provides a linear path for the program to follow. It’s the kind of music that sets her up for success as well as the intricate opening steps, an effortless sequence of rocker and bracket turns, leg extended, to showcase the precision of her skating.

Setup, she knows, is everything. Set yourself up for failure with a bad opening sequence and the whole program might as well be scrapped; set yourself up to fall with an awkward transition into a jump and you will. During the choreographing of this program, she’d drilled the opening steps in excruciating detail for days before she’d even considered allowing the choreographer to tack on the steps into her first jump of the program. Now, those turns, shifting her weight onto the inside edges of her blades to drop into an easy, half-second spread eagle before rocking off her right foot to a back outside edge from which she’d kick her leg into a fan spiral – just barely sustained – are all but second-nature. She’d accept nothing less. They’re easy, steps she can feel confident that she’ll carry off flawlessly before a volley of crossovers and a more sustained spread eagle take her into her double axel, the only jump she’ll complete before the second half of the program.

(It should be a triple – everyone who’s seen the videos she’s posted of herself drilling the jump in practice knows that – and it’s only because of her coach’s excessive caution that it’s a double. Never mind – at least one less rotation all but guarantees a flawless landing.)

Jumps get harder to land as program progresses because, as a skater’s legs tire, the risk of falling rises. But for those who can pull it off, the jump’s point value is raised for having been completed late in a program – it’s a key consideration when composing a program and one that Azula’s team took note of. She has the stamina she needs to pull off a “backloaded” program, so there’s no reason not to save the remaining two out of three required jumping passes in a short program for the end. That means that the middle of the program consists mostly of spins, which have never been Azula’s favorite. They don’t carry the risk that jumps do, but neither do they carry the potential reward, or the excitement, or the sheer power. Spins are about finesse, grace, flexibility – things Azula has in spades compared to most skaters but doesn’t count as her strengths. She’s certainly not a pretzel like Ty Lee, so flexible that she can twist herself into spin positions that border on absurd, and though there’s nothing wrong with her spins (far from it – they’re always given among the best Grades of Execution in a given competition), they’re not special. _Bad_ would be fine, because _bad_ can be improved. But to be good, and _not special –_ that, she cannot stomach. 

It goes without saying that she does not particularly like this section of her program.

The music continues to build as she spins – this tango builds almost constantly until, after the biggest crescendo, its sound and power diminish again – and, by the minute-twenty-second mark, she’s setting up for the steps leading into her triple lutz-triple loop combination. It’s her hardest element, and though she could’ve easily saved it for last just to show off, she’s too pragmatic; Azula Nishimura knows that she is the best in the world, but she won’t take stupid risks without cause. If she times it right, she’ll land the second jump on a particularly insistent triplet in the bass line of the music for the perfect emphasis. It’s the make-or-break point of the program, really, given its high point value, but she’s not concerned. She doesn’t fall – pretty much every skater’s been fighting a grueling battle with gravity since their first halting steps onto the ice, and she’s just about the only one who’s _winning._ Oh, sure, others are consistent, but most of them are fifteen and gravity gets the jump on them as soon as they can no longer prevent their bodies from growing. Not Azula – she’s done growing, at seventeen, and her jump technique is solid is ever.

So she’s shocked when, as high and clean and corkscrew-tight as both jumps come off, she’s a beat too early in the music.

It’s not really a big deal in terms of scoring. Really, it’s only impact that’s lost by landing too early to meet the crescendo of the music, but she _needs_ that. When it comes to the Program Components Scores – the numbers awarded to the intangibles, things that can’t be assigned point values but affect the quality of a performance nonetheless – impact and polish are all Azula has. She knows she’ll never be praised for her charisma or warmth, never be called an artist; she doesn’t feel the music she skates to (that is and always has been her brother’s thing) so much as she uses it as a tool, a vehicle which transports her all-important technical elements. _Once again, with feeling_ aren’t words she’ll ever hear, because, best in the world or not, no one expects sensitivity or emotion from Azula Nishimura. Really, when Azula takes stock of what else she has going for her PCS score – solid basics, polished presentation, and that’s about it – that missed crescendo means more than an outsider would assume that it did. And that thought is enough to send her spiraling.

_Three more elements,_ she reminds herself, imploring mind and body alike to grit this out and ignore the pressing weight of even the tiniest mistake. It’s easy enough to numb herself as she catches an edge into the last of her three spins, to lose herself in the _snap_ of a well-done back camel spin and the strain in her hamstrings when she drops into a broken-leg sit spin. But she is still just a beat behind her usual place in the music, and the thought jolts her every time it crosses her mind. Her best attempts at precision have failed her and, for a perfectionist as ruthless as she is, even such a minor, hair-out-of-place mistake is devastating. She tries to get a few more rotations out of the final position of her spin, hoping that it’ll get her back on track, but she can tell that it’ll become dangerously slow and wobbly if she doesn’t check out – so much for that idea. She tries holding her landing a second longer than usual to make up the lost time but finds herself, instead, a beat late, stumbling into her step sequence in her rush to fall back in time with the music.

  
Usually, this step sequence is commandingly powerful. It’s aggressive and dynamic and cleverly-choreographed and, even without her trying to woo them, its intensity almost always has the audience in the palm of Azula’s hand within a few beats of music. Usually, it’s an unexpected highlight of her short program. But she doesn’t _feel_ the authority that this music demands today, not like she usually does – she’s not comfortable, not in control. She feels as if someone has found a chink in her armor, and, no matter how small it is, that puts her on the defensive.

She knows by now that the defensive is never a good place to be. She almost never _feels_ seventeen on the ice, carrying herself with the bearing of someone much, much older; now, though, she feels as vulnerable as she ever has, a child losing her grip on the one thing in her control. Perhaps, under other circumstances, she’d consider such a meltdown over something so small pitifully weak, but right now she’s in too much of a panic-induced daze to think about it. _One jump,_ she thinks, as if begging herself not to let go when she isn’t out of the woods yet. The running three turns into her triple flip aren’t where they should be in the music, though, and their rhythm cannot follow the melody the way it always does. She cannot seem to pace them right without that guide and by the time she taps her toepick into the ice to launch into the jump, she’s picked up near-uncontrollable speed.

Usually, a jump is simply a matter of transferring momentum: _forwards_ into _up._ The toe pick or edge that she takes off from is merely a conduit, moving the speed she’s built up vertically, and there’s a solidity in that feeling of an effortless transfer of momentum that’s almost comforting. It is perfectly controlled and entirely trustworthy. But _this_ – this wild careening towards a destination at which she’s afraid to arrive – is not it. This is something she hasn’t felt in ages, and fear clamps its icy fingers around her stomach as her landing foot hits the ice, too far forward. Her free leg swings around to check out of the jump far more quickly than it’s supposed to and sends her landing foot skidding to a stop before it finally stops cooperating entirely.

It’s been so long since Azula has fallen that she barely remembers the jolt of impact or the feeling of powdered ice left behind by spins and turns clinging to her tights. She almost has to shake herself just to make sure that this isn’t a stress-induced nightmare, and though she has nothing more to do here, her heart falls the way she hates to admit it even can when she realizes that she isn’t going to wake up.

_Stupid,_ she chastises herself. _One tiny mistake throws you off and you go and make an even bigger one._

She turns to the audience, clearly as shocked as she is if the pause between the calling of her name and the start of their applause means anything, and, for a weak, pathetic moment, she smiles.

_Image, Azula. It’s all you have._

She finds herself doing that more often in the days ahead: when the standings come in, when her father barrages her with angry voicemail messages, when Kyoshi pulls her aside to ask if she’s feeling all right. It’s the oldest trick in the book, one she’d always loathed but has begun to see the use for: paste on a smile, and at least one little corner of the world learns to shut up and stay out of your way.

No one cares what’s fake and what’s real, after all.

**

**_Caldera Cricket Club_ **

****

“ _Fourth?”_ Katara opens her mouth as if to add to that, then closes it, stunned. It is difficult to imagine a world in which Azula Nishimura is not first. “Behind _who?”_

“Well, at least in the short program…” Zuko double-checks the results on the webpage he already has open on his phone before he continues, “Suki won, but she and Mai were within two points of each other, so it wasn’t by much.”

“Oh, she did? Good for her!” Katara’s a little surprised that she hadn’t already learned that, but Suki has never been one to boast, so she isn’t too shocked. “And who’s third?”

“I’ve never heard of her,” Zuko says with a shrug that looks too forced-casual to be natural. “Some girl named Hina Oyama who’s…some sort of a late bloomer, I guess. I looked her up and apparently she’s our age” – most singles skaters make their senior debuts around fifteen or sixteen and establish themselves soon after, so to have a breakthrough at nineteen or twenty is a bit more unusual – “but she’s had a really good season and I guess she did well here, too.”

“Oh, her?” Toph calls from the bench where she and Aang are unlacing their skates a few yards away. She doesn’t look up, but it’s clear that she’s smirking. “Hm. Interesting.”

_“Toph,”_ Aang warns, his voice strained with what Katara assumes is embarrassment.

“What? I didn’t even say anything,” Toph says innocently. “I’m just surprised that Zuko’s never heard of her, training with you and all.”

“Why would that…” Zuko looks over to the pair for answers. “Where would I have heard about an obscure Japanese skater who’s only just now getting recognized and what does that have to do with the two of you?”

“Oh, nothing,” Toph says nonchalantly.

  
“ _Toph.”_

“Just that my partner here never shuts up about her.”

“ _Tooooph.”_

“I’m just stating facts, Twinkle-Toes.”

“But I’ve never even heard him mention her,” Katara cuts in, puzzled. “Do they know each other?”

Aang looks up from his skates and she’s amused to see that his cheeks are bright-red. “I’m right here, Katara. You can ask _me.”_

“I know, but Toph seems to have something she isn’t telling us,” Katara replies. “Which is…?”

“Nothing,” she says again. Tease as she does, she’s clearly not giving up her partner’s secret that easily. That’s the paradoxicality of Toph Beifong – she’s loyal to the end, but no one she loves is ever safe from a joke at their expense around her, either.

“Hina and I met at Cup of China last year,” Aang reluctantly explains. “We talk sometimes. She’s cool. There’s literally no reason to turn this into a thing.”

“Oh.” Katara’s eyes light up in recognition. “So you _like_ her.”

“As a _friend.”_

“Mmhm.” Katara turns to Zuko with a smirk that he doesn’t quite know what to make of. “Of course. I think it’s-“

“-I’m _serious!”_

“-nice that you have friends outside of the Cricket Club.” Katara blinks innocently and Zuko finally, _finally_ catches on, trying not to laugh. “I certainly don’t.”

“Really? That’s too bad,” Aang says with what seems like genuine sympathy, all talk of Hina Oyama forgotten. He turns to Toph, then, and Katara turns back to Zuko.

“Have you talked to Azula since…you know…all of this?” she asks.

“I tried. She isn’t answering texts.”

“She’s probably pretty cut-up about this,” Katara replies.

“Yeah. I’m sure she is.”

“Are you worried about her?”

  
Zuko shrugs. “She’ll bounce back. Always does.”

Katara lays her hand against Zuko’s forearm. “Runs in the family, then?”

Zuko looks down at Katara’s hand, bewildered, but doesn’t move. “Uh…I don’t know if I’d say that.”

She smiles. “But I would.”

**

**_All-Japan Figure Skating Championships – Ladies’ Free Skate_ **

**_Osaka, Japan_ **

****

_Even if you tank, you’re already doing better than anyone thought you would._

Mai Uchida can’t say that the thought is particularly comforting before a performance that’s likely to determine as much as her Nationals free skate will, but it’s somehow helpful, in a dour sort of way. She’s not one for stage fright, anyways; she doesn’t really think that she needs reassurance the way some skaters do. No, what she needs before she takes the ice is drive. Purpose, motivation, a reason besides pride or passion to care how she places.

  
Maybe that’s why the platitude is soothing – it _is,_ in its own way, a mission statement. If she can skate as cleanly tonight as she did in the short program, she’ll prove herself worthy of that placement, show that it wasn’t a fluke. Expectation is what has so often held her back, not because she can’t stand up under pressure but because the expectations placed upon her have absolutely nothing to do with Mai and everything to do with the people she’s supposed to beat. Mai Uchida can land her jumps, lay out serviceable programs nearly every time she skates, but that’s not what anyone expects of her. Oh, no – she is to be _extraordinary._ Even in practice, it’s obvious that Mai isn’t quite what anyone wants when she’s compared to her training mates.

Azula Nishimura is robotically consistent and as classically elegant as anyone could hope she’d be. Mai’s admirable record wilts in comparison and she’s rougher around the edges than Azula has ever been.

Suki Tsumura is open and warm and sweet and full of heart, and her jumps are airy and elegant and smooth as silk. Mai is cold and closed-off, with jumps that do the job without much grace, and she’ll never be the fan favorite that Suki is.

Ty Lee Park is flexible and balletic and musical, and she performs to the very last row of the stands. Mai hates spins almost as much as she hates dancing, and she’s often criticized for her inaccessibility.

Mai Uchida is, plain and simple, not what anyone wants, because they seem to have found all they wanted in her training partners. Never mind that Mai’s basic skating skills – her command of edges and turns, the way she utilizes the ice surface, her speed and power – rival even Azula’s, or that she is the only one of the three competing a triple axel. It isn’t enough, not to anyone who sees the people she skates with day in and day out.

But today, it could be – _has_ to be. Mai is in a position she’s never been in before: ahead of Azula, within striking distance of Suki. She could walk out of this arena today a National Champion in one of the world’s most competitive ladies’ fields. If she plays her hand well, Mai Uchida could be the envy of the entire world – for once, the gold standard and not the standard-bearer.

_Seven jumps. No sweat,_ she thinks, half-sarcastically, with the undulating, unassuming opening notes of the violin which begin her program. Jean Sibelius’ Violin Concerto in D Minor isn’t exactly a popular choice of music, but it’s not groundbreaking, either – even if the piece isn’t used for skating enough to be counted among the “warhorses,” a dubious honor reserved for figure skating’s most overused pieces of music, classical music is never controversial. It’s a very Mai Uchida choice: conventional, but not drably so; layered and dynamic and entirely devoid of the brightness or sass that so many other skaters try to capture. It’s the kind of music that all but begs not to disappear in the midst of the noise but does anyway.

Really, every detail of this music, of her program, of her ombré-dyed grey dress, is like that: it is created for momentary impact to be entirely forgotten when its three minutes are over and the world ceases to revolve around whether or not Mai Uchida will land her jumps. And she is so _sick_ of that, so utterly contemptuous of the way she’s been forcibly relegated to the shadows since she moved to Canada. She realizes, reeling off an opening triple lutz-triple toe loop combination with almost no effort, that she isn’t going to let that be the story of this free skate.

Long as her odds of success are, the fact is that she beat Azula once already; there’s nothing to say she can’t do it again. After all, no one really understands what was going on in Azula’s head during her short program, or why she spiraled over absolutely nothing, so no one can say that it won’t happen again. And Mai, if she skates the way she _knows_ she can, has a shot at the national title. It’s exactly the purpose she needs to render jumps that would worry her and footwork sequences that would seem impossibly cold and emotionless utterly insignificant.

A chance. A _choice._ She’s never had those things before, not with Azula around. They are friends, according to Ty Lee and to Azula’s perfectly-curated Instagram feed, but it’s no secret that Azula sees Mai as a sort of vastly inferior version of herself, and Mai sticks around Azula for…reasons. Some days it’s hard to know what those are. She might be a glutton for punishment, trailing after the girl who reminds her endlessly of her own inadequacy so that she won’t forget it; maybe she’s too afraid of loneliness not to stick around. Or perhaps it’s a strange sort of pragmatism, and she stays because perhaps, if she does, she might find some exploitable weakness. Maybe it’s the explanation she hates most: she looks up to Azula Nishimura with fervor that borders on hero-worship, and she’ll carry the crushing weight of her own inadequacy if it means that the person she admires most will notice her. Either way, it’s meant nothing more than seven years in Azula’s shadow, and though she knows she’ll never be the skater that Azula is, it makes her seethe that nothing she accomplishes will ever mean a thing to most people unless it eclipses her friend.

She is flushed and panting by her final pose, but she cannot hold back an indiscreet fist-pump at the triumphant closing chords of the concerto. Whatever happens later, she’s gone clean – this is as close to a perfect skate as she’s managed all year – and she cracks a very uncharacteristic smile when her currently-first-place scores flash across the screen. As one of the highest-ranking skaters after the short program, she skated in the last of the six warm-up groups, and only two skaters remain; even if they (Azula and Suki, naturally) both place above her, she’s guaranteed a medal, which essentially guarantees one of three available spots on the Japanese team for the World Championships in a couple of months. It’s as good a result as she could possibly have asked for and, for a moment, she’s genuinely happy.

That’s before she remembers, though, that none of what she’s done this weekend – not one second of her greatest triumph in a good, long while – is going to mean anything if she doesn’t beat Azula, and that rare, ephemeral haze of contentment seems a far-off dream indeed.

**

Every ice sheet smells different.

Most figure skaters would agree with that statement: every rink has its own aroma, some combination of rubber and chlorine and a crisp, chemically chill in the air that somehow manifests as a scent. But it’s always fascinated Suki more than most. She loves that about ice rinks, and it’s a practice of hers to sniff the air a few times upon entering a new rink just to see how many of its undertones she can catch. This one is different, since nearly every stadium that is used as a rink smells an awful lot like human musk, but still, Suki breathes in to ground herself when her name is announced to raucous applause.

She knows that audiences like her. She knows that Japan’s figure skating fans are unanimously considered to be the most enthusiastic in the world. But…well. Suki isn’t the favorite at Japanese Nationals – never has been. She’s been competing at senior Nationals since she was thirteen (though she couldn’t compete internationally as a senior until she was fifteen), and she hasn’t been favored to win a single one of those six years. It’s a strange feeling. She feels a little narcissistic for admitting that she loves it.

Still a little nervous, Suki adjusts the black mesh straps of her dress, takes one last drawn-out breath, and takes her opening pose. She’s in as good a position as she could be, and this free skate has been a hit elsewhere, with nearly every audience she’s performed it for clapping along at least for a few seconds, but it’s hard not to be cowed. She’s not the stage-fright type but an audience of this size, and competition of this caliber, would scare anyone, she thinks.

Not to mention the numbers Azula put up five minutes ago, which more than made up for her flubbed short program. She’s in first, with Suki last to skate, and she’s tempted to abandon all hope of the title and gun for second. But…

She had a seven-point lead on Azula after the short. She has a program that fits her like a second skin and an audience rooting for her.

_Just think about this,_ she tells herself. _Think about now, what_ you’re _doing. Not what she did._

And it’s easy to let the music carry her. It’s a march, upbeat and uplifting and exactly the kind of music she’d have chosen for a moment like this if she had known, back in June when she got this program choreographed, that she’d be facing one. Its rhythm is bouncy, too, and it lends itself well to the rise and fall in her knees that’s always come so easily to her. Skating this program feels almost buoyant and that’s exactly what she needs right now. She leans hard into the rise and fall of the choreography, into the takeoffs of each of her jumps (perhaps a little too much – she can tell upon takeoff that her second triple lutz is going to get an edge call), into the feeling she wants to spread through the arena and throw out to the rapt spectators every time she extends her open hands. _You have to be in the moment if you ever want to bring your audience into it with you,_ her choreographer, Jeong Jeong, had told her several years ago, when she’d been a scared, scrawny twelve-year-old recently arrived in Canada with a minimal English vocabulary and an arsenal of massive triple jumps; today, it’s a grounding reminder not to let the stakes weigh so heavily on her mind.

_Now_ is what she needs to fix her eyes on. The scores will wait and the results will follow, but only now will she have a chance to make her mark, and an audience waiting to be dazzled, uplifted, plucked from their realities and plopped down in a world where things _mattered_ like they never seemed to in real life. After all, if her skating doesn’t bring joy – to herself, to her audience, even to the judges – why bother with it at all?

She barely notices the elements pass by under her blades, or anything but the music and the cut of her edges across the ice. She’s not sure where this near-dreamlike autopilot is coming from, but she’s unable to fight back her smile at the end of a program which, if the way she’s breathing is any indication, took more out of her than she realized. Kyoshi even gives her a rare hug as they step into the kiss-and-cry, and another when her (barely!) first-place marks appear onscreen.

Later, she’ll grasp the significance of this moment, what it means that she came out on top against odds so stacked against her. But in this one, there is only now.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If anyone was curious, which I know no one was but idc, these were my dress references: 
> 
> Azula's short program: https://www.gettyimages.no/detail/news-photo/emmi-peltonen-of-finland-in-action-during-ladies-free-news-photo/1196267389?adppopup=true
> 
> Mai's free skate: https://www.pinterest.com/pin/344173596500335782/
> 
> Suki's free skate: https://www.pinterest.com/pin/221661612896030528/
> 
> And music:
> 
> Suki’s FS: https://youtu.be/HgXwuDyCTfk
> 
> The other two are mentioned by name and easy to find online. I cut Azula’s music to the correct length so I could listen to it for inspiration as I wrote, but since the Sibelius Violin Concerto is like thirty minutes, I didn’t bother for Mai’s. (I almost had her use the Tchaikovsky concerto because I’ve played it and it’s my favorite, but Sibelius suits her better.)


	6. Countdown

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *skates in seven minutes before midnight the day I'm supposed to post* heyyyyy! 
> 
> This one is filler, again, because New Year's Eve.

**_Caldera Cricket Club_ **

**_7:30 A.M._ **

**_New Year’s Eve_ **

****

“I’m still not exiting that on the right edge.” Katara pauses only briefly to tighten her ponytail before she sets her hands on her hips, her dissatisfaction obvious. “We need to run it-“

“Katara…”

“-again.”

“For once in your life, can you _please_ show a little mercy?” Zuko knows he’s being dramatic but he doesn’t care. She’s breathing as hard as he is, and this, frankly, is getting out of hand.

“Not if we want to make it to Worlds, I can’t,” she says. “I’m not sure if you noticed, but I’ve exited the twizzle-“

“Be more specific.”

  
“Step…twenty-one, I think?”

“Some of us don’t have the rulebook memorized, Katara. _Which_ twizzle?”

“All of us _should,”_ she shoots back. “The first Key Point.”

“You should have led with _that.”_

“You should know the step numbers.” Katara pauses, reaches for the water bottle she keeps on the boards, takes a sip, and sets it down again in the space of thirty seconds – she’s had enough strict coaches to get good at taking her water breaks quickly. “Why are we fighting about this, anyways?”

“Because this is, like, the seventh time you’ve made us run the Finnstep in an hour and a half, and because Iroh is going to make us do it, like, at least five more in the next forty-five minutes.” Zuko folds his arms across his chest. “I get it. I want this as badly as you do-“

“ _Do_ you?”

The accusation should sting, but it’s been a long time since Katara stopped pretending that Zuko has anywhere near her overwhelming dedication to or passion for skating, and he’s as willing to admit it as she is. “Okay, maybe not _as_ much, but I want to do well, and I get it. We have to fix this.” He raises his hands helplessly. “But I don’t think that running ourselves into the ground trying to fix every minute detail of _one_ element in a day is going to get us anywhere.”

“But it’s the only thing that _will,”_ Katara insists, throwing a wary glance around the rink to make sure Iroh isn’t watching and waiting to make sure that his star pupils aren’t wasting their time. “Break it down and drill it. That’s what we have to do if we want to stop losing points on the same things at every competition. We can’t afford-“

“Katara. Hey.” He reaches for her hands like he’s taken to doing when she’s working herself into a panic, which she often does. (He lacks the wherewithal to care if his motivations for doing so are entirely pure anymore.) “I get it. I do. But both our brains are fried, and we’re way past the point of getting anything done if we keep working on this. We should move on and come back to it in our lesson” – they’re not always working with Iroh when they’re on the ice, but they have at least one lesson a day – “if Uncle thinks we need to. Okay?”

“I…I just don’t know.” Katara shakes her head helplessly. “I don’t know if I’m going to be able to focus on anything else until I nail that Key Point.” She senses Zuko’s inevitable reply and amends, “the _entire_ key point.”

Zuko’s gotten better at being the voice of reason lately, but he’s still putty in Katara’s hands; he sighs in defeat. “All right. One more time.”

Katara drops his hands but, evidently, Azula catches a glimpse before she does. He curses himself for forgetting that this is a mixed-discipline practice session (in contrast to their ice dance-only ones, which are less popular and thus less frequent) when she catches his eye with a knowing smirk and mouths _get a room._

He hates that she’s done that enough times now that he knows how to read that phrase on her lips.

**

**_New Year’s Eve_ **

****

**_9:00 A.M._ **

****

“Katara?”

_This can’t be good._ Katara knows now that Iroh only uses that tone – the one that’s supposed to sound grandfatherly but never quite manages to convince her – when there’s something wrong. She’d thought that their lesson had gone well, in spite of the scolding she’d received for spending an entire practice session on only one element ( _apparently_ that’s counterproductive and a bad use of time, or something), and she can’t think of any good reason he’d be using The Voice unless it didn’t. “Yes?”

“I want to talk to you after you get your skates off,” he says, angling his face away from Zuko as if to keep this between them even though his nephew is three feet away. (He is, as is his custom, standing like a lump a ways off.)

_Crap._ This can’t be good. “Is…is something wrong?”

“Wrong?” Iroh’s brow furrows. “No, unless you think something is?”

“No, no, it isn’t that. I just…” Katara tries not to look like she’s having a very unwanted flashback to the day in her eleventh-grade precalculus class when her teacher had called her up to interrogate her about suspected cheating she hadn’t been involved in. She picks at the hem of her jacket, self-conscious. “Am I in trouble?”

“Not at all. I just like to touch base with my students from time to time. Make sure new partnerships are gelling.” He winks, which Katara isn’t sure how to process, and Zuko shoots her a sympathetic look. “Is that all right with you?”

“Uh…sure.” Katara gives him a tight smile, though she can’t say she isn’t still a little worried.

“He probably just wants to tell you to take it easy,” Zuko says as soon as his uncle is out of earshot. “I wouldn’t worry too much about it.”

“I have never in my life had a coach who wanted me to ‘take it easy.’” Katara shakes her head disapprovingly, ponytail falling in matted curls around her neck as she bends down to untie her skates. “I find it far more likely that he thinks we’re incompatible partners and he wants to break us up so you can skate with someone better, or-“

“Katara, he loves you more than he loves me, and I’m his blood relative,” Zuko says drily. “He’d sooner kick _me_ out of the rink than you.”

“I don’t believe that for a second.”

  
“Okay, obviously that’s an exaggeration, but you get the point. He keeps telling me you’re the best thing that’s ever happened to me.”

“He…does?” Katara finishes unlacing her skate and looks up, eyes and cheeks bright. “That’s…that’s nice of him.”

“I mean, he isn’t wrong.” Zuko pauses and then adds, “skating-wise.”

“Right. Skating-wise. Of course.” She forces a smile and wonders why it’s forced. “Thanks.”

“Yeah, anyway, you’ll be fine,” Zuko says, far too eager to change the subject.

“Hopefully.” Katara eases off her left boot and slips into the lightweight running shoes she always wears to and from the rink. There’s a unique kind of luxury to the feeling of wiggling her toes once she has her spacious trainers on after they’ve spent hours jammed into the torturously narrow toe box of her skates, and she lets it ground her before she gives Zuko a perfunctory and entirely unsolicited pat on the shoulder (he stiffens, and it almost makes her laugh) before she goes off to join Iroh by the locker rooms.

“I’m not going to bite, Katara,” Iroh says when he sees her approach. Katara is a decent enough actress after years of performing, but it’s hard to hide her nerves with the way she’s wringing her hands right now. “I’m just worried about you.”

“Worried?” Katara shakes her head emphatically. “I’m completely fine!”

“Well, for the moment, yes.” Iroh drums his fingers against the aluminum water bottle tucked under his arm, an anxious habit she’s noticed that Zuko shares; perhaps he picked it up from Iroh. “But I do worry that you’re…overextending yourself.”

“No, I promise, I’m being careful,” Katara insists. “Zuko and I are taking it really slow with the new lifts, you know that. We’re not doing anything crazy.”

“I feel like that statement could apply to more than just lifts-“

“It’s highly inappropriate of you to even suggest that,” Katara interrupts him, surprised at her own assertiveness even though it’s never exactly been something she lacked in the past. “And if you’re going to make inferences about your students’… _romantic entanglements-“_

“I was referring to that choreographic sequence in your free dance, Katara. You certainly don’t seem to be in any rush to make any changes, even though we’ve been talking about it for weeks.” Nevertheless, he smirks. “But it’s interesting that your mind went elsewhere.”

“…it doesn’t mean anything, I swear,” she insists, blanching. “It just really seemed like that meant…something else.”

“I know. No _entanglements_ implied.” He shakes his head fondly. “Get your head out of the gutter, Miss Nutaraq.”

“It wasn’t in the gutter to begin with,” she mutters. “Anyways. You were saying?”

“Right. This is the fourth day in a row I’ve seen you two drilling your Finnstep for over an hour,” Iroh continues. “Which, while a good idea in principle, is…concerning for several reasons.”

  
“But we need the practice.”

“Yes, but you won’t make any progress if you overextend yourself and, besides that, you still need to be aware of your injury. It hasn’t been as long as you think it has since you couldn’t even skate.” His eyes are kind, but Iroh’s words cut deeper than he means for them to. “I know you don’t want to hear this, but you can’t force progress. You can give it your all, but if you’ve hit a wall, you can’t always knock it down just by throwing yourself at it over and over.”

“But…I _haven’t_ hit a wall. There are just a lot of details to keep straight.”

“Right. And how are you going to do that if your brain is fried from keeping track of all of those details over hundreds of repetitions?”

  
“It isn’t hundreds,” Katara says under her breath.

“Regardless of the actual number, what I’m saying is that I want you to find a better balance,” Iroh tells her. “Mastery is the goal, but that doesn’t mean that you can neglect every other part of your programs to nail down the Finnstep. You have to train your muscles so that they know _everything_ they need to know, not just the one element that keeps getting you stuck on the details.” He pats her shoulder. “Besides, you’re driving my poor nephew out of his mind. Not that he doesn’t need it…” Iroh chuckles. “But I could just tell earlier that if you’d made him run that pattern a single time more, he’d have walked out.”

“He wouldn’t do that!”

“In spirit, if not in body.” Iroh reaches for her shoulder again. “Your work ethic is wonderful, Katara, but you’ll get more results if you don’t devote so much of your attention to only one thing. You’ll get the details even without that.”

“Um…okay.” Katara swallows hard. “Is…is that all?”

“Well, yes, unless you had something else to discuss with me?”

“No, of course not.” Katara manages a stiff smile. “Um…I’ll take that into account. Thank you.”

“Oh, and Katara?”

She turns back on her heel. “Yes?”

“It’s New Year’s Eve,” he tells her. “Have a little fun, will you?”

Katara nods, but she’s not so sure she’s going to take his advice.

**

**_New Year’s Eve_ **

**_2:45 P.M._ **

****

“What did my uncle want to talk to you about earlier?”

Zuko doesn’t broach the topic of Iroh’s conversation with Katara until the last session of the day is over and they’ve taken their skates off. Stretching at the wall, it seems as good a time as any to ask the question that’s been on his mind all day.

“Oh, just not to overdo it,” Katara says casually, leaning into her right leg where it’s propped up on the edge of the rink’s wall. “With the Finnstep, specifically, but…I think he meant it more generally.”

“Oh. Right.” Zuko almost smiles. “Good.”

“You’re only saying that because you didn’t want to run the pattern,” she huffs. “Do you have any idea how humiliating it is when your coach thinks he has to tell you to have fun?”

“Uh…I live with him, and he’s been saying that to me for years, so…yeah. Yeah, I think I do know.”

“Oh, so you got the ‘it’s New Year’s Eve, you should go live a little’ speech, too?”

“Every year,” Zuko says after a pause to switch the leg he’s stretching. “Ty Lee’s a chaebol heiress, and she can get into pretty much any exclusive…well, _anything-“_

“Didn’t she just move here to train a few years ago?” Katara raises an eyebrow. “How’d she manage to build a reputation like that so fast?”

“Connections, I guess. Ty Lee is like a social life magnet. Anyways, she started off going to this annual New Year’s Eve party that a sorority at the university threw, but Mai and Azula went once and said it was trashy, so she ended up finding this ritzy thing at a fancy hotel downtown and now they go to that every year. Uncle found out about it two years ago and he’s been hounding me to go with them ever since.”

“Sounds like Azula,” Katara remarks. “Don’t those kinds of things cost money?”

“Oh, yeah, but Ty Lee’s family is loaded. She just pays their way in.”

“Wow. And she can just…do that?”

“She’s even offered to get me in last-minute when the tickets usually sell out in November.”

“And you don’t take her up on it, I assume.”

“No, but Uncle is always telling me I should go. ‘Live it up,’ I think those are the words he always uses.”

“Let me get this straight. Your uncle, an _elite athletic coach_ , is trying to convince you to go get blackout-wasted in a room full of people you’ve never met? Like, he’s actively encouraging that?”

“You know how he is,” Zuko replies. “Unconventional. It’s his thing.”

“Well, clearly. I’ve never had a coach tell me to stop drilling my patterns before.”

“Nor, I would guess, have you ever had a coach who would rather you went to a party than stay in, go to bed early, and avoid alcohol like the plague.”

“Oh, I already do that,” Katara says. “I mean, avoiding alcohol. Not my thing.”

“Really? Me too.” Zuko offers her a surprised half-smile. “Uncle thinks I don’t want to go because I hate people, but it’s actually the drinking that I don’t like.”

“You can’t tell me that the idea of interacting with total strangers for hours on end doesn’t play into that, though.” Katara leans an inch closer over her leg, which is propped up on the wall so that her foot nearly touches his. “I mean…you’re not exactly a people person.”

“Well, yeah. But what is there to do at a party if you don’t drink?” Zuko shrugs. “Nothing, right?”

“Dance?” Katara offers.

“I hate dancing.”

She stares at him, incredulous, and he cannot honestly claim that he knows why.

“Zuko,” she says, “ _you are an ice dancer.”_

“Not the same.”

“It’s in your job title!”

“Well, yeah, but it’s still not the same as flailing around on a cramped floor with a bunch of drunk people’s elbows flying in my face!”

“Didn’t you say this thing was fancy? It’s probably ballroom dancing. Classy. Dignified. Literally the dry-land version of what you spend every single day doing.” Katara smirks and she can tell from the apprehension on Zuko’s face that he knows what she’s driving at. “Now that you mention it, do you think Ty Lee could squeeze me in?”

  
“I mean, she _could,_ but I’m not sure if she _would.”_

“Well, why not?”

“Azula…doesn’t exactly like you all that much.”

“She doesn’t exactly like _anyone_ all that much, Nishimura.”

“Well, it’s possible that she’d try to talk Ty Lee into refusing. I don’t know – she doesn’t exactly hate you, but she’s been kind of a mess since Nationals and I have no idea what she’ll do.”

“That’s pretty petty. I don’t think she’d do that unless she had a specific reason to, and I haven’t given her one,” Katara reasons. “Plus, I know she likes my plus-one.”

For the first time in months, Zuko gets her meaning immediately. “Katara, _no.”_

“It’ll be fun!” she insists, and he wishes he could rewind to the moment when she’d been so averse to the idea of following their coach’s instructions. “I mean, if neither of us want to drink, we can just hang out, right? And…it’s good for us to spend time together off the ice. For, um, bonding. Trust. Real important, right?”

Zuko raises an eyebrow. “If you wanted to ask me out, you could’ve just _said_ that.”

“I’m not!” his implication sails straight over her head. “I swear, I’m not! I just don’t want to spend the night watching period dramas in my sweats and resisting the urge to order a pizza and, well…if Ty Lee can really get me in, this party seems kinda fun.” She smiles shyly and ducks her head to tuck a lock of hair behind her ear. “I’ve always wanted to do something nice for New Year’s, but it’s never been possible.”

Zuko pauses to consider, then asks, “are you going to make me dance?”

“That’s sort of the point.”

“Katara…”

“Look, there’s a good chance Ty Lee can’t or won’t be able to get me in, but if she does, why shouldn’t we?” Katara glances back up at her partner, her cheeks flushed with what could be the cold or excitement or…something else. “I mean…we don’t get a lot of time to be young, do we? And dressing up and going somewhere, marking the fact that this isn’t just any other Wednesday night – I mean, wouldn’t that be fun?” she bites her lip, apprehension creeping into her expression when the doubt won’t leave Zuko’s eyes. “Together?”

He lets out a heavy sigh, and she isn’t sure what it means for a fraught moment, but then he speaks.

“If Ty Lee can do it, I guess I’ll go.”

**

**_New Year’s Eve_ **

**_6:28 P.M._ **

****

“So you asked him out.”

“I did not ask him out!” Katara protests, nearly yanking out her eyelashes with the curler clamped around them in indignation. “I just…invited him to hang out!”

Suki cackles through the phone. “You totally asked him out.”

“Oh? And what about you and my brother?” she challenges. “Was that coffee shop study session _not a date?”_

“Of course that was a date. Did he not know that?”

“Oh, honey…”

“Don’t you have to get ready?”

“Quit dodging the question, Suki.”

She hangs up and Katara shakes her head fondly before she unclamps the eyelash curler.

**

**_New Year’s Eve_ **

**_6:32_ **

****

“I see you have an engagement tonight.”

“It’s not an _engagement,_ Uncle. I’m just going out.”

“Zuko, you go out so little that it’s an _engagement_ when you go to the grocery store. This is something else entirely,” Iroh says, a knowing twinkle in his eye as he watches his nephew fiddle with the cuffs of the suit he only ever wears to post-event banquets. “So, where are you going?”

“That thing at the hotel.”

“With your sister?”

“With _Katara,”_ he corrects, before realizing that this was absolutely the wrong thing to say.

“Finally making something of that crush of yours, eh?”

“Um, _no._ She invited me, and it’s not a date.”

“Right.” Iroh shakes his head. “That’ll change by the end of the night.”

“Uh…no it won’t.”

“Trust me on this one, Zuko. That date won’t not be a date for long.”

**

**_New Year’s Eve_ **

**_7:45_ **

****

Apparently, this party at the Royal Caldera Hotel is the kind of thing one shows up to at least a half-hour late – at least, that’s what Katara is hoping, because downtown traffic in Caldera on New Year’s Eve is awful and Zuko isn’t arriving to pick her up until seven forty-five. Sokka has his own plans, so he needs their shared car; she doesn’t like leaving things in Zuko’s hands when he’s not always punctual, but he has a car and she doesn’t, so she has no choice.

And it gives her heart ample time to flutter at the thought of the way she’s agreed to spend this night. She checks her hair a thousand times even though its loose curls were simpler to arrange than any of the hairstyles she wears to compete, and forces herself to avoid touching her face and ruining her makeup; she considers at least four outfit changes and chides herself for focusing so much on the trivialities of her appearance when it doesn’t matter, not really. But there’s little else to think about, and little that can distract her until she hears Zuko’s car pull into the now-empty driveway and, hurriedly strapping on her most inadvisable pair of heels (her feet are usually too important to risk this way).

_Not a date, Katara,_ she tells herself, but that does very little to keep her from stumbling on the porch steps when Zuko steps out of the car in a suit a thousand times neater than anything she’d have expected him to own, disarmingly unaware of its effect.

“Zuko,” she says shakily, straightening up and willing herself not to trip on the floor-length hem of her banquet dress. It’s aubergine satin, slinky in the bodice and loose in the skirt and tied up in the back with a satin corset closure – the kind of thing she’d have to be insane to wear in the frigid Canadian winter, even with the flimsy shawl she’s draped around her shoulders. But she doesn’t mind the cold, somehow.

“Katara.” He sounds like he’s swallowed a frog. “I. Uh. Um…”

“I’m freezing,” she says to break the ice. “Maybe we should…?”

“Yeah. Yeah, definitely.” He nods a little too enthusiastically and opens the passenger door for her. “Sorry to keep you waiting. Ty Lee told us to be a little bit late.”

“No problem,” she replies, trying to sound more nonchalant than she feels. “You, um…you look nice.”

_Don’t stare,_ she implores herself, but she still steals a look over at him out of the corner of her eye.

He doesn’t even try for subtlety. “You look nicer.”

Katara’s so taken-aback that all she can manage in the seconds following his reply is an incredulous giggle. “Um…thanks,” she sputters after another awkward moment of disbelieving silence. He’s never quite been this forward before. “I think I’m going to get cold, but, I mean…gotta give this dress some mileage, right?”

“Sure.” He doesn’t seem to have any idea what she’s saying, but he nods anyway. “So, uh…Ty Lee texted me the tickets, so we just have to show them our phones and ID at the door. Might be a line, though.”

“A line outside?” Katara asks, already imagining hypothermia setting in.

Zuko doesn’t reply, and she takes that as a yes.

**

**_New Year’s Eve_ **

**_8:22 P.M._ **

****

This line, even twenty minutes after the beginning of the party, snakes around the block. Apparently it’s not quite so exclusive as Zuko was led to believe and he can’t help but notice that Katara is about five seconds from shivering – hours spent in the artificial cold of a forty-degree skating rink, apparently, have nothing on five minutes out in the natural cold of winter.   
  
Wordlessly, he slips his jacket around her shoulders. He’s always run warm anyways.

**

**_New Year’s Eve_ **

**_8:31 P.M._ **

****

They’re nearly to the front of the line and out of the cold, but Katara doesn’t particularly care. Even with Zuko’s jacket draped around her shoulders (and that alone feels like its own sort of miracle), she’s freezing. But she’s noticed in the past few months that Zuko always seems to be a few degrees warmer than her, and without any better options, she decides to take advantage of that.

He doesn’t say anything when she takes a step backwards to soak up his warmth as much as she can without touching him, and when his arm settles at her elbow so lightly that she can barely feel it, she doesn’t dare to move.

**

**_New Year’s Eve_ **

**_9:52 P.M._ **

****

“I told you I wasn’t going to dance!”

“But did you really think I wouldn’t make you?” Katara flashes Zuko her best megawatt grin as she pulls him onto the dance floor. “Really, Zuko. I expected you to know that about me by now.”

“Know what?” despite his resistance, his hands settle at the small of her back.

“That I don’t give up,” she says, and he finds himself swaying to the generic swing music they’ve been playing all night without even wanting to. Really, with the abundance of Michael Bublé covers on the playlist for this event and gorgeous, well-dressed people dancing in pairs who’ve all spent far too much money to be here, it could be a competition; it’s sort of a comforting thought, though not really.

“Oh, trust me, I know that.”

**

**_New Year’s Eve_ **

**_11:01 P.M._ **

****

Zuko studies Katara as she waves away a fluted champagne glass, offered by a waiter carrying them around on a tray. She’s not wearing his jacket anymore, and he’s tempted to study the planes of her back where her dress exposes them, but he resists – she’d probably slap him if she knew he were thinking about it – and instead turns to face her when she’s finished dealing with the waiter.

“Not even a little champagne?” he asks. “I mean, not that I’d want you to! Just…I’m surprised.”

“Nope.” Katara shakes her head. “It’s just not my thing. I hate the taste, I hate the smell, and I don’t really want to risk losing control and doing something I’ll regret, you know?”

“Yeah.” He nods, unsurprised by her answer – it’s very Katara.

“What about you?” she asks.

Zuko shrugs – it’s not an answer he particularly wants to give, but he will anyways, because something about Katara makes secrets feel a little less urgent. “My dad was a pretty heavy drinker. Not, like, an alcoholic or anything, but he drank a lot to cope with work stress. And…he wasn’t exactly pleasant to be around when he was drunk. I guess I just decided as a kid, seeing that, that I wasn’t going to let that be me.”

Katara is silent for a moment, surveying the crowd, and she doesn’t look at him when she replies, “thank you for sharing that.”

“’Course.” _It’s kind of hard not to,_ he doesn’t say. “It’s not really a big deal, I just don’t like to drink. Same with Azula, although I’m pretty sure that has a lot more to do with the fact that she thinks it’s an unnecessary distraction.”

“She isn’t wrong.” Katara pauses to take a fancy appetizer that neither can identify from yet another perambulatory waiter. “Speaking of, how’s she holding up?”

  
“Mad, for one,” Zuko says. “I’ve never seen her angrier than she was when I picked her up from the airport. Losing was bad enough, but losing to Suki was an even bigger blow.”

“It’s not like Suki didn’t skate lights-out, too,” Katara counters, suddenly defensive.

“Oh, yeah, no, even Azula didn’t deny that. But Suki is their coach’s favorite, and Azula’s constantly trying to prove that she’s better than her. It doesn’t ever actually endear her to Kyoshi, but losing a competition to her made it that much harder.”

“Think she’ll bounce back?”

“Oh, for sure, but it’ll be rough for a while. I’m glad I don’t live with her, that’s for sure.”

“Right. Because she shares that apartment with Mai and Ty Lee,” Katara recalls. “I’m surprised she’s the type to live with her rivals.”

  
“Keep your friends close and your enemies closer,” Zuko remarks. “And your frenemies closest of all, I guess?”

“Fair enough.”

“Speaking of Suki, are she and Sokka out of the forest yet?”

Katara laughs as easily as she has in months. “You remembered!”

“Of course I did. It was awful, and I _wish_ I could forget it, but I didn’t.”

“Actually, it was a Christmas tree lot, but same difference, right?” Katara can’t remember the last time her heart felt so light or her smile so natural. “Yeah. She told me she got fed up with his denseness and kissed him at the end of that study session that was actually a date.”

“Honestly, good for her. Some guys just can’t read the signs.”

Katara chooses to stifle a laugh behind her hand and refrains from commenting on the irony of Zuko, of all people, saying that. “Seems that way, doesn’t it? Anyways. They’re a thing now, I guess. They’re at a party some of Sokka’s hockey friends are throwing, probably getting totally trashed and making out in a corner.”

“While we stand in the corner of a fancy ballroom eating weird, tiny food and talking about our tragic pasts,” Zuko says. She can’t help notice that he seems as at-ease as she does.

  
“I kind of like it this way, though.”

He doesn’t have to fake his answering smile. “So do I.”

**

**_New Year’s Eve_ **

**_11:56_ **

****

It’s almost midnight.

It’s almost midnight, and when the ball drops (not that either of them will know – this is far too posh an event for something as undignified as televised countdowns), every couple in this room is going to ring it in with a kiss, and the very idea speeds Zuko’s heartbeat to an unhealthy pace.

She’s happy and carefree and at-ease and _gorgeous_ and he realizes with no lack of gravitas that his desire to battle face when the clock strikes twelve is…rather intense, but it’s not as if he’ll ever make good on it.

Why would he? She’d just scrunch her eyebrows in that oh-so-very Katara Nutaraq way and laugh it off – “must’ve gotten caught up in the moment,” she’d probably say.

No. He’s not doing that.

**

**_New Year’s Eve_ **

**_11:58_ **

****

This Zuko is…one Katara has never seen, to say the least. One she wonders how she’s missed and wishes, watching the tension in his shoulders melt away and his smile spread across his face at the smallest provocation, that she’d known about long ago.

This Zuko is still undeniably Zuko: he’s dorky, a little antisocial, says the oddest things imaginable. But he’s confident in that, it seems – maybe it’s the effect of the suit. (That _stupid_ suit – she blames it almost entirely for her present preoccupation.) He carries himself with an ease that he rarely possesses.

  
And it’s…it’s _unfairly_ attractive.

The thought of midnight crosses her mind, and she wonders what it would feel like to take the leap, make the stupid choice for once. She bets his lips would be as warm as the rest of him, as soft as his eyes in the dim light of the ballroom. But he’s so skittish, and she’s terrified of sending him back into his shell when he’s only just opened up.

No, she can’t risk it.

**

**_New Year’s Day_ **

**_11:59 A.M._ **

****

Maybe it’s a malfunction, or maybe it’s a miracle. Either way, Zuko’s not sure where he got the courage to meet Katara’s eyes, the question they’re asking all too obvious.

**

**_New Year’s Day_ **

**_11:59 A.M._ **

****

_Is he…?_

“Happy New Year, Zuko,” Katara manages, even though she’s a few seconds early and breathless with the very thought of what he _might_ be asking.

**

**_New Year’s Day_ **

**_11:59 A.M._ **

****

“Happy New Year, Katara.” His hands settle at the small of her back, turning her to face him.

_Am I really…?_

**

**_New Year’s Day_ **

**_12:00 A.M._ **

****

All she can think to do is laugh.

**

**_New Year’s Day_ **

**_12:00 A.M._ **

****

“What’s so funny?”

**

**_New Year’s Day_ **

**_12:00 A.M._ **

****

“Nothing.” Katara bites her lip sheepishly – it’ll be 12:01 soon, and she’s pretty sure she’ll lose her chance as soon as the clock turns. But she doesn’t really mind. “I just had a crazy thought.”

**

**_New Year’s Day_ **

**_12:00 A.M._ **

****

“What was it?” Zuko asks. He doesn’t know when or how his face came to be so close to hers, but he can’t complain.

**_**_ **

**_New Year’s Day_ **

**_12:00 A.M._ **

****

Her hands settle at his shoulders. “I was just looking at you,” she says, caution discarded in the face of near-undeniable evidence that this wouldn’t be the misfire it could be. “And I thought…’ _damn,_ do I want to kiss my partner.’”

**

**_New Year’s Day_ **

**_12:00 A.M._ **

****

“And you didn’t?” Zuko is aghast for more reasons than one.

**

**_New Year’s Day_ **

**_12:00 A.M._ **

“I mean…how was I supposed to know that you wouldn’t-“

**

**_New Year’s Day_ **

**_12:00 A.M._ **

He doesn’t even let her finish her sentence. Zuko Nishimura is pretty sure that he has never been assertive in his life, but there is absolutely _no_ way he’s going to let this opportunity slip away. He nearly topples backwards as she leans into him with her full weight, probably to stop herself from stumbling in her heels, but he manages to brace himself and…

Well.

Katara Nutaraq, apparently, is as good at kissing as she is at absolutely everything else.

**

**_New Year’s Day_ **

**_12:00 A.M._ **

“Confidence is a good look on you, Nishimura.” Katara’s hand is braced against Zuko’s chest so she won’t collapse from the sheer shock of it all.

“Um…thanks?”

Katara laughs and, feeling bold, brushes her lips against his. “This is gonna make things awkward, isn’t it?”

Zuko returns the gesture. “Not necessarily.”

“I mean-“

“I like kissing you, you…apparently?...like kissing me – I don’t see the issue.” He’s looking down at her with plain amazement that nearly bowls her over all over again. “Why would that be awkward?”

“We’re coworkers, Zuko.”

“Who already have to act like we’re in love, so I don’t think that’s going to be an issue.” He pauses. “Besides, why are we thinking about that now? I wanna kiss you again.”

“So confident all of the sudden,” she teases, but she’s not one to leave him hanging. “I know I already said it, but…happy New Year, Zuko.”

“Happy New Year, Katara.”

There should be fireworks, Katara thinks. There should be violins, and time should freeze, but there is only soft jazz and time, unfortunately, does nothing of the kind. This is the kind of moment that calls for all of that but it has none.

  
All it has, really, are a girl and a boy, dizzy with realization and too lost to care. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am so freaking BAD at slow burn. Send help.


	7. Hometown Crowd

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is a day late. I'M SORRY. But hey, at least this is getting up before midnight my time (by 12 minutes?)...? heh? But I like this one! It's fluffy! And I can never get enough of AUs where Azula is raised by...not Ozai and thus doesn't become truly evil, and she and Zuko are very close but very prickly disaster siblings who like to roast each other viciously. Yeah. That is my *stuff.* So I hope you also like that. 
> 
> (Also, Trish, #1 Azula Nishimura stan: this one's for you.)

**_Canadian National Championships_ **

**_Montreal, Canada_ **

**_Short Dance_ **

****

“Kind sir!” Katara taps Zuko’s shoulder, then extends her gloved hands in front of her as if asking for alms. “A kiss for luck?”

  
“I thought we’d been through this…” 

“Been through what?” Katara cocks her head innocently.

“We’re…we can’t let anyone _see_ this…thing… _us?_ That we’re a thing,” he finally manages after a few painful seconds of stumbling.

“Zuko, it’s _Nationals.”_ She unclasps her hands and takes his, tracing the lines of his palms through his gloves. “We need all the luck we can get.”

“You’re not really asking me to kiss you because you think it’ll improve our scores, ‘Tara.”

“Nah, but it would be nice anyways.”

He crosses his arms. “Wait until the TV people and their creepy little backstage cameras catch us and put it in one of those little backstage footage snippets they always put between programs on the broadcasts.”

“The cameras are watching Lee and Song, Zuko.” Katara shakes her head fondly. “Need I remind you that we’re not exactly popular?”

“Fine,” Zuko grumbles. Katara knows this drill all too well by now, even though it’s barely three weeks old: she stands on her toes (it’s hard to do with her skate guards are, because she can’t use her toe picks for balance, but she doesn’t mind) and leans forwards, presenting her forehead for Zuko to kiss. In public, it’s never a proper kiss – it is her forehead, or his cheek, or either of their noses. But it is sweet nonetheless, and Katara gives Zuko’s hand a squeeze when they’re called out of the waiting room for their on-ice warmup.

In some ways, the Canadian National Championships are one of the lower-stakes competitions they’ll face each season. Because the pool of competitors must come from Canada, it’s smaller, and the competition isn’t as fierce. Most strong skating countries, save for the ones with obscenely deep fields in one area or another (ladies’ and pairs in Russia, and both singles disciplines in Japan), have a handful of top competitors – two, three, maybe five if they’re incredibly lucky – and a much, much larger pool of lesser skaters competing simply to improve upon last year’s placement because a medal and the coveted international spots that come with it is out of the question. Zuko and Katara fall solidly between those two camps.

Canada’s ice dance field is strong, but there are only five or so teams with realistic shots at a medal. The top three teams will be sent on to the World Championships at the end of March, and all five of the couples with even an outside shot at the podium will be vying for one of those spots. Zuko and Katara, if they pull off another performance like the ones that secured them a top-five placement at the NHK Trophy, could easily be one of them; they could also, if their programs go the way of Skate America, fall out of the top five. They’re neither favorites nor underdogs.

They can work with that, though.

Their names came up first in the draw for skating order yesterday, so Nutaraq and Nishimura will be taking the ice first in their warmup group. By now, the audience here – a little bit more robust than it was at Skate America, not as much so as it was at NHK – knows their names, and they’re greeted with, at very least, polite applause. (Really, there’s little enthusiasm at all for anyone but Lee Xiong and Song Jisu, the undisputed favorites. Even Katara, who’s unironically referred to herself as an “attentionvore” on several occasions – Zuko hadn’t gotten it at first – can’t really be discouraged when they’re like that for _everyone.)_ It’s like breathing, by now, to take their place in the left-center of the ice. But it feels just a little different now.

Just a little more electric. Just a little more real, the story they’re playing out, now that Katara settles just a little more comfortably onto Zuko’s knee when she perches their int heir opening pose, and now that Zuko gives her hip a subtle squeeze (his sleight of hand is impressively good when he wants it to be) before she stands. This time, he doesn’t even need to be in his character – the bumbling, awkward recipient of Katara’s attempted flirtations – to follow the movements of her hips as she presents at the beginning of the program. When she leans forwards on her toes and her hands graze his chest, he doesn’t have to fake the comically shocked expression that Iroh has been trying to get through his head for months. And it’s almost fun – when was the last time Zuko thought _that_ about a performance? – to slip into the role of the clueless paramour he already sort of is.

He catches Katra’s smile over his shoulder as he extends his arm above his head to turn her, and he thinks she’d be proud to know that he notices that she exits the twizzle on the right edge.

_Take that, Key Point._

It’s kind of unbelievable how this is working out – how _different_ competing feels now. Zuko doesn’t know if he’s ever been in love with figure skating the way Katara is, but the more he shares with her, the more of that love he’s picking up by osmosis. He wants this for her – he always has, since the moment she stepped onto the ice at the Caldera Cricket Club for the first time, all unruly curls and wary smiles, and made him forget, briefly, how to exist (he’d never have admitted to it at the time) – but that goal’s slowly started to be more personal than duty to a partner. This, after all, is his _thing._ He’s given the best years of his life to this sport, and even though it isn’t one he chose for himself, it’s still his. It’s the thing he’s best at, and the one he can’t stand the thought of giving up.

After all, there has to be a reason beyond Katara’s surpassing loveliness that Zuko Nishimura is willing to stomach the Finnstep, the horrors of illusion mesh, and the rather embarrassing way this program highlights him (he hates being highlighted) in the slower “Mister Cellophane” section. (If he hates being highlighted, he _hates_ that song.)

And he finds himself at the conclusion of their program, when he braces himself so that Katara can lean into him triumphantly, as if she’s made some sort of conquest (she really has), hoping it’ll be enough. Because he’s _never_ been enough before, but with her, he feels miles away from the boy whose conveyer belt of partners never ended.

With her, he could snag one of Canada’s three spots at the World Championships, and he wonders what he’s going to say to her if they don’t.

“Got that Key Point!” Katara murmurs happily against his faux-tuxedo jacket, arms around his neck.

  
“You did,” he replies. He wants to nuzzle his cheek against her hair, but he’s not exactly eager to find out what the internet would say if he made such a public declaration of his feelings for her partner. Doubtless it would all probably be positive, but he’s learned from Katara, who apparently read a great deal of Oma Li/Shu Inori fanfiction in her youth, that skating fans who jump onboard popular ships – usually pairs or ice dance teams (he knows for a fact that Toph and Aang have an ardent Tumblr army of shippers, and they’re _sixteen) –_ can get…

Well, _scary._

He has nothing to hide, but he’s not exactly eager to risk it.

“I meant you, silly,” Katara teases after it becomes clear that he’s too frozen to say anything. Reluctantly, he loosens his arms and they present to the audience before heading to the Kiss and Cry. “That mohawk. Your edge wasn’t flat this time.”

“Oh, yeah.” He smiles to himself. “I guess it wasn’t.”

**

**_Canadian National Championships_ **

**_Montreal, Canada_ **

**_Between Programs_ **

****

A new team, unprecedented success, a rumored romance – there’s no way in any universe that Katara Nutaraq and Zuko Nishimura aren’t going to be forced into an unwanted interview before the end of Nationals. Katara knows this, and if it’s the price she has to pay for a second-place finish after the Short Dance that absolutely no one saw coming (save for one extremely enthusiastic Twitter user – alias @iced4ncetrash, display name: ‘nishimura/nutaraq lovebot’ – whose ‘I-told-you-so’ tweets about her preferred team’s success have been hollering to the unwashed masses of the internet since the Short Dance ended), she’ll brace herself and fake a smile.

But what she didn’t count on was Skate Canada’s relentless marketing department. Or being forced to do something so, _so_ much worse than an interview.

Interviews were easy enough. Sure, they were painful, especially for Zuko. But she could do the talking, and she knew a thing or two about canned answers by now. They were easy to give and easier for the not-so-adoring public to completely ignore; they never said anything remotely interesting, after all. But…

“So basically, this is the newlywed game?”

The poor intern who’d been sent to recruit Katara and Zuko for the series of “fun,” “entertaining” promotional interviews their top-scoring skaters would be giving nods frantically. This kind of stunt – having skaters play simple games on film to make the audiences feel as if they know them (since they’re conducted with the explicit understanding that nothing controversial or even interesting is to be said, they do absolutely nothing of the sort) – is commonplace at Skate Canada’s big events. “You guys are gonna write down the answer you think your partner would give to a series of questions, and we’ll see who’s right,” the intern tells them.

Zuko sighs heavily, but he knows that they aren’t being given the option to refuse.

**

“Okay, you guys ready?” another intern, this one decidedly perkier – naturally, given that she’s the on-screen girl – asks. Katara and Zuko, seated across from her in hard, high plastic chairs in eye-searing neon yellow, nod. Katara fakes a semi-convincing smile; Zuko only manages a grimace. “Great!” she chirps. “Zuko will give the answer that he thinks Katara put down first, and then Katara will give whatever she thinks Zuko’s answer was. Got it?”

This is probably more for the audience’s benefit than theirs, but both nod anyways.

“Okay, first question.” She shuffles around a stack of index cards in her hands, even though they all know the order she’s going to ask the questions is. It’s all so canned that Katara is shocked that the intern didn’t tell them what to write down, or force them to reveal their answers to each other. That, at least, is a small mercy: Katara will get to react to her inevitable victory in real time. “What is your partner’s favorite book?”

Zuko holds up his first card, marked ‘Wuthering Heights?’. “I wasn’t really sure,” he admits, shrugging. “I just went with something I figure she would’ve read in high school because I actually haven’t, um…seen Katara read.”

Katara’s heart swells with affection, even though that’s just about the least Katara Nutaraq book he could’ve chosen and she’s pretty sure that’s an insult coming from someone who loves books as much as Zuko does, because only he could make a completely prefab press-junket game so utterly _awkward._

She holds up her card, on which she’s written ‘The Fault in Our Stars.’ “I know, I know,” she laughs, perfectly, endearingly abashed, because she knows that’s exactly what they want from her. “It’s generic, but I really do love it.”

“Huh. I never would’ve gotten that.” Zuko gives her a tiny, corner-of-the-mouth smile, one so clearly meant only for her that she has to bite her lip to keep from grinning like an idiot. _I didn’t know that about you,_ he seems to be saying. “What’d you put for me?”

  
She holds up her next card. “ _The Orchid Society,”_ she reads. “I don’t know, I saw him reading it on a plane once” – it takes great effort not to burst out laughing – “and he really seemed to like it.”

“No, but good try.” His nervous eyes dance now. “I do love those books, but I’m gonna have to go with _Pride and Prejudice.”_

The intern lets out an audible _aww._ Katara, for the first time in their twenty-minute acquaintanceship, has to agree.

  
“Really?” now she doesn’t even try to stop herself from grinning. “What, fancy yourself a Mr. Darcy?”

“Nah, I just like the story.” He bites his lip in an unsuccessful attempt to hide a sheepish smile, and Katara is glad he doesn’t do that too often because if he did, she’s pretty sure he’d have about eighteen marriage proposals from random strangers who’d happened to see him within an hour every single time.

(She might be a little bit in love – the realization makes her laugh even more than the incongruity of grumpy, impulsive Zuko’s love of Jane Austen.)

“Who doesn’t love a well-read guy, right?” the intern says, clearly sensing _something_ and seeking to get them moving. “All right, next question. What music would your partner skate to next season if they could pick absolutely anything? Katara first this time.”

She raises her card. “I know this is his favorite piece of classical music,” she explains, pointing to the words _Rach 3_ scribbled semi-legibly on her card. “Rachmaninoff’s third Piano Concerto. I don’t know if he’d have chosen it for this, but…why not, right?”

He nods. “I had Rach 3 too. Guess you, uh…get a point for that?”

Katara looks to the intern, who marks a tally on a whiteboard. “Yup, you got it! Now let’s see if Zuko can tie it up.”

Zuko doesn’t even read his card, which reads ‘Hamilton,’ aloud. “She is _so obsessed,”_ he says, as if this is a great annoyance. “I’m pretty sure she has, like, six different music cuts for a Hamilton free dance sitting in her laptop, waiting until she has an excuse to use one.”

Katara sighs, mostly for show. “Guess I don’t get to keep my lead,” she says, revealing a card that also reads _Hamilton._ “Next question?”

“Okay, we have a tie!” the intern announces. “Next question. What’s your partner’s favorite thing about you? Let’s switch the order again – Zuko, what do you think Katara thought your favorite thing about her was?”

“Um…I’m really not sure,” he says, holding up a card that reads ‘everything’, tilted down a little so it’s hard to read.

  
Katara needs to figure out how to get ahold of herself before her heart is a puddle in her chest and _she_ is a puddle on the floor of this stupid media room, but she’s really not in any position to do that.

“I thought he would say, like, my determination,” she says, praying that her cheeks aren’t red enough for her blush to show up on camera. “But that’s very sweet of you, Zuko.”

Zuko’s cheeks are _definitely_ red enough for his blush to show up on camera. All too eager to move the game along, he holds up a card that says ‘mysteriousness’ so high it nearly blocks his face. “I don’t know, it seemed like something you’d say as a joke,” he says. “I don’t really know what I thought you’d say.”

“I know it’s not a noun,” Katara says, pointing to the word ‘considerate’ on her card, “but it’s, like…I like how considerate he is.”

“You do?”

She risks an open smile. “I do.”

“Aww, you two are too cute,” the intern gushes. _Can she not?,_ Zuko seems to be saying in the way he grimaces at that. “Okay, last one. What is your partner’s favorite holiday? Hold up your cards at the same time this time. We’re tied up, so I want to see who wins all at once. Got it? On my count.” They nod, and she continues. “One, two, three…”

_New Year’s Eve,_ both cards read, and neither partner can help but burst out laughing.

**

**_Canadian National Championships_ **

**_Montreal, Canada_ **

**_Free Dance_ **

“Hey. Look at me.”

“Katara, don’t.”

“No, no, come here,” Katara says gently, taking his chin in her hand and leveling it to meet her eyes. “We’re going to be just fine. We’re in a great position, we have enough of a cushion in our score that we don’t really have to do all that well to stay in the top three, and you love this program. We’re going to kill it, you hear me?”

“I wish I knew that,” he replies.

Katara can’t take this anymore, and she wraps her arms around his waist. He, miraculously, responds in kind.

“We’ve been doing great all season, Zuko. We’re at our best. We have nothing to worry about.”

“But the rotational lift-“

“We’ve done it perfectly in practice, like, three trillion times,” she says. His chin comes to rest at the juncture of her neck and shoulder. “I know you wouldn’t have agreed to do it if you didn’t know that you could do it safely. I _know_ that, Zuko.”

  
“Yeah, but it’s one thing to make that agreement with your _partner,_ and another thing entirely to make it with your _girlfriend.”_

“I’m…technically not your girlfriend,” Katara says after a moment of stunned silence.

“Oh, you’re not?” Zuko pulls away, a little confused. She’s grateful that he’s not frantic anymore but wonders what she’s getting herself into. “I mean, we’re, like…kissing a lot? And I kind of thought that made me your boyfriend?”

“Oh, Spirits, you really _are_ Mr. Darcy,” Katara mutters under her breath. “I…think you have to ask me, but now isn’t-“

“Do you wanna be my girlfriend?”

“-the time.”

“Sorry, that made me sound like I was twelve. Um, do, uh…wanna be a thing?”

“Um, that’s…not much better.” Then, for propriety’s sake, she adds, “warmup in ten.”

“What do you want me to say, ‘ _you have bewitched me, body and soul’?”_

“I…really don’t know.” Katara wipes her clammy palms on her tights. “I’m sorry, I’m being a jerk, aren’t I?”

“No, no, not at all. It’s just…I thought you were my girlfriend, and I really wish you actually were, so…I don’t want to mess this up. Like the lift.” He flashes her a lopsided smile. “Except with less, um, life-or-death, uh…ramifications.”

“Of course I will,” she says gently, laying her head on his shoulder because she’s as afraid of the much-maligned backstage cameras as he is after five days of practice and she can’t risk kissing him. “Not exactly the best timing, but…I mean, it works, right?”

**

It does – sort of – work.

Later, going through the scoring protocols, their Interpretation scores are the highest they’ve ever been. Those longing gazes, that lovelorn anguish – none of it is faked anymore, and apparently it shows. Sure, it’s a little tricky to stay in the character of someone watching the love of their life slip away when the opposite is true in reality, but the emotion is genuine.

So is the sloppy, distracted footwork, though. So are the Level 2 twizzles.

(That new rotational lift is fantastic, though. It gets at least five minutes of screentime on the broadcast, because apparently Skate Canada has no better footage to fill the breaks between programs with than slo-mo shots of Katara’s _anguished_ expression as Zuko tosses her over his shoulders with an easy deftness that belies his nerves.)

But, at the end of the day, third place is third place. They don’t maintain second – the third-place team from the short dance pulls above them by seven points, which is a little embarrassing – but that barely seems to matter when Katara shows up at the door to Zuko’s hotel room at eight in the morning the day of the gala, knocking frantically and rousing him from his sleep while she herself is just up and still in the leggings and Caldera Tech sweatshirt she’d slept in.

“’Tara?” he mutters, lifting his glasses to rub at his bleary eyes when he gets the door. Clearly, he’d been sleeping until she showed up; she’d feel bad, normally, but she’s far too excited to think about that now. “Is something wrong?”

She shakes her head emphatically. “They put up the assignments!” she whisper-shouts, trying not to wake the whole floor. Most skaters are assigned roommates, but Zuko doesn’t, so he beckons her to follow him in and then closes the door behind them.

“You mean-“

“Look at this,” she insists, turning her phone to face him. He squints, takes the phone, and pinches the screen to zoom in; his sleepy eyes widen when he realizes what had Katara so excited.

“We’re…” he glances up at her in disbelief. “We’re going to Worlds?”

“We’re going to Worlds!” she squeals, throwing her arms around Zuko in total disregard for the safety of her phone. He’s too shocked to respond for a moment, but when he finally comes to his senses, he folds her into a half-asleep, half-elated embrace.

“Who would’ve thought?” he says, mostly to himself.

“No one,” Katara giggles, then adds, “ _thank_ you.”

“For what?”

“Um, we kind of qualified as a team?”

“Oh, right.” Now that there are no lurking cameras, he nuzzles his cheek against her hair. “I think you deserve a lot more of the credit than I do, though.”

“Oh, shut up,” she mutters, so elated that all she can do after that is laugh and laugh until it runs its course. “Just shut up and kiss me.”

“Right. No cameras.” He shakes himself. “Of course, ‘Tara.”

Kissing Katara is always a little intimidating, but today, it doesn’t feel anything but _right._

**

**_Caldera_ **

**_Five Days Later_ **

****

“So, I heard you finally got your head out of-“

“Shut up.”

“-the sand, you dumb ostrich,” Azula scoffs, settling into the chair across the table from Zuko’s. “I watched Nationals.”

“Oh?” Zuko doesn’t want to let on how much he appreciates that. “And what did you think?”

“Sloppy turns, stationary twizzles, didn’t hit any of the musical accents, but hey, that lift was finally decent,” she assesses. Zuko doesn’t have the energy to care before he’s downed at least two cups of coffee, and he’s still nursing the first, so he says nothing. “And clearly, you two idiots figured yourselves out. I also saw that game they made you play – what was up with that?”

“Stupid marketing ploy. I’m sorry you had to see that.”

  
“Oh, but I’m not.” Azula smirks over her raised latte and takes a sip without breaking eye contact. “That was some tension you had going on, little brother.”

“I’m older than you.”

“Not in spirit,” she shoots back. “Anyways. What’s up with you two?”

He weighs the costs and benefits of sharing the relevant information. Azula had requested that they ‘meet at a neutral location,’ so he assumes she’s not trying to blackmail him for information on her competitors or any of the other tricks she’s tried before; she watched Nationals without prompting, so he’s pretty sure she means well.

“We’re a thing now, I guess,” he says, trying so hard to sound casual that he nearly chokes on a sip of (black) coffee.

“Oh, good.” She clearly already knew this, but she nevertheless keeps up the façade. “Guess that means you two can quit your ridiculous pining. It was really getting pathetic.”

“Is that why you wanted to talk to me?” Zuko asks. It’s always best to tread carefully with Azula – he knows that she cares about him, and he privately thinks he’d do just about anything for her (barring the many unethical things she’s tried to have him do to advance her career), but he can never tell whether he’ll get his little sister, the lonely seventeen-year-old who needs a listening ear, or Azula Nishimura, the ruthless competitor who only wants exploitable information.

“No, I wanted to talk to you because…” Azula shrugs. “I don’t know. I don’t exactly keep much company these days.”

“You have Mai and Ty Lee,” he offers lamely, even though he’s rather touched.

“Mai, who won’t talk to me _and_ nearly beat me at Nationals, and Ty Lee, who spends every second of her free time learning Blackpink dances in front of a full-length mirror that takes up most of our living room? Please.” Azula sighs heavily and takes another sip of her latte. “When you consider my other options, my little brother doesn’t seem too bad.”

He doesn’t bother to correct her this time. “So you wanted to get coffee because you’re lonely?”

  
“I didn’t say I was lonely.”

“You know, we’re hardwired to need human connection-“

“Don’t you dare go therapist on me, Zuzu.”

“Why do you call me that when I could just as easily call you the same thing?”

“Because it pisses you off. Why else would I?” Azula’s smirk returns, which he takes as a good time. “And what if I told you I was just here to ply you for information about your girlfriend?”

“You wouldn’t do that. She’s of absolutely no strategic use to you.”

“Wrong. She’s friends with Suki,” Azula says. “And I see that you’re not denying that she’s your girlfriend. Interesting.”

“Didn’t we already establish that she was?”

“Well, yes, but-“

“How are you holding up?” Zuko asks suddenly. He might not get another chance, and she seems likelier to be honest now than she usually would be.

“Don’t change the subject, Zuzu. We’re here to talk about _you.”_

“Technically, you never stated a purpose for this meeting, so no, we’re not.” Zuko has been learning to speak her language for years, and though he’s never been fluent and doubts he ever will be, he’s certainly conversational. “And if we’re going to talk about Nationals, I want to know how you’re doing with…you know, yours.”

“I liked you better when you were all angsty and maladjusted,” Azula scoffs. “All of this therapy is going to your head.”

“That’s…kind of the point of therapy, isn’t it?”

“I’m fine.” She sets down her latte with a vindictive _clunk._ “I’m mad, of course, and it isn’t helping matters with Kyoshi-“

“I really think Kyoshi would like you more if you didn’t look like you wanted to commit homicide against all of her other students,” Zuko cuts in. “ _Sources of income,_ if you want to think it like that.”

He can’t believe he’s actually saying any of this, but if it helps Azula, he’ll try just about anything. After all, he’s the only person whose help she’ll ever come close to accepting: Iroh tries, but she’s never trusted him; their father is the cause of the bulk of her problems, and their mother was always a little distant with her and…well, not around to fix it anymore; Ty Lee would almost certainly try to provide emotional support if she thought Azula needed it, but Azula would never allow it. But she doesn’t distrust Zuko the way she does them. It was Zuko who held her hand the whole flight to Canada when she was ten and terrified to admit she was terrified of flying. It’s Zuko who comes to her practices, because the only thing Azula is more obsessed with than success is being alone in that success, and he isn’t about to allow that. And, at the end of the day, it’s Zuko she calls when their father bombards her with angry voicemails after a disappointing competition.

  
She is difficult, certainly, but so is he, and she hasn’t exactly had the chance not to be. He sticks up for her because she’s never been able to get out from under their father’s thumb the way he has, and she knows that. She trusts that – it might be the only thing that she _can._

Hence this, a peace talk on neutral ground.

“Well, yes, but I can’t help that they’re in my way,” she sniffs.

“…you really don’t see the issue with that mentality?”

“Not if it helps me win,” she answers honestly.

“You have to know that you can’t expect yourself never to falter, Azula. That just doesn’t happen.” He meets her eyes. “It isn’t human.”

“Well, hooray. Guess we can scratch ‘possibly an android’ off the list of things that are wrong with me.”

“Azula, I know you know that isn’t what I’m saying.”

“Well, yeah, but that doesn’t make it any better when I get out of a press conference and see that Dad called me sixteen times and left a message every single time.” She scuffs the toes of her Doc Martens against the polished wooden floor – she’s tiny, and even full-grown, her legs dangle enough from the chair to allow it. “All of which involved a lot of shrieking into the phone loudly enough to wake the dead about how I wasn’t warranting my own expense.”

Zuko’s fists ball under the table. “He-“

“Oh, come off it, Zuzu,” Azula scoffs. “It’s not like he doesn’t have a point. I mean, he _does_ own most of the companies that sponsor me. If I’m not returning any sort of incentive for them to keep giving me money, I’m a bad investment.” She takes another sip of her latte, which Zuko has noticed she usually does when she wants to hide her face. “It stings, but it’s just business. Corporations don’t give up their hard-earned profits to train half-baked athletes.”

“Azula, if you’re half-baked, I’m, like…raw ingredients.” He shakes his head. “Not even that. I’m a bowl of flour, and the recipe has, like, thirty other ingredients.”

“You’re not wrong, but your partner is a five-tiered wedding cake, so it balances out,” Azula replies. “You know what I’m saying.”

“Uh, no, I don’t, because you win everything.”

“Not _everything.”_

“One thing doesn’t count.”

“One thing is _all_ that counts.” Azula is clearly ready to move on, so she continues, “now, tell me about this whole dating thing. What exactly happened there?”

Zuko knows what happens when he pushes Azula too far all too well, so he indulges her.

“So…remember that fancy hotel party?”


	8. Synchronicity

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Welcome to the Taang chapter! I’ve never written about pairs skating in fiction, and afaik blind figure skaters are not really a thing, so this is going to be a challenge, but I hope you guys like this bit of our favorite Sui/Han stand-ins since I haven’t had much of them yet. (I tried to work Toph’s blindness in semi-realistically - obv it’s not 100%, so please be nice heh.) I don't think Toph was ever this secretly-soft in canon, but I like her, and a lot of characterization choices that would be OOC in canon fic can be justified in modern AUs, so...I'm gonna do it.
> 
> Confession: I watched a livestream of the trip from the Incheon Intl. Airport to Seoul via the APEX Express Train for the purposes of this chapter, because I've never been and I didn't want to describe it inaccurately. I am a lot of things, but uncommitted is not one of them.
> 
> Also, in case I’m bad at describing them, please refer to these videos of the pairs elements mentioned here. 
> 
> Triple twist: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RyOj6RS18pU
> 
> Throw triple lutz: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TFNZ8Rd6Lkw
> 
> Death spiral: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TAfI98zsfFg
> 
> Side-by-side jumps and spins are just the jumps and spins you'd see in singles performed simultaneously by both partners. Lifts are like ice dance ones, except that they are overhead and thus have very different entries.
> 
> Lastly: I've gotten to the point where I'm fresh out of AtLA characters to name-drop and am using TLoK characters for this (provided that they aren't the Gaang's kids/grandkids, since that would be very weird). That said, please enjoy the mental image of Bolin and Kuvira as a pairs team.

**_Incheon International Airport_ **

**_Seoul, South Korea_ **

**_En Route to the Four Continents Figure Skating Championships (4CC)_ **

****

No one ever thinks about how many ways there are to compensate for a lack of sight, and usually, Toph likes it that way. She nearly always has an upper hand when people don’t realize that she doesn’t need working eyes to see. It’s a hidden advantage, and she’ll take any of them that she can get.

But tonight, she wishes she didn’t need them.

“I wish you could see this,” Aang breathes, reaching across the armrest between them to squeeze her forearm. He’s in the window seat – no matter what the mode of transportation is, he always gets it, because there’d be no point in giving it to Toph – and she can hear from the way his voice is muffled that his face is probably close to the glass.

“It’s just a city, Aang. I’ve not-seen, like, every city in Asia.” She frees her arm to fold it across her chest, slouching down in her seat. “How’s this one any different?”

“ _Every_ city is different,” he says. She tucks her feet underneath her, which she knows is probably frowned upon, but she doesn’t care. The train seats seem to be upholstered in the stiff plush material characteristic of public transportation worldwide (she knows this because Aang has told her at least a thousand times that the flooring always seems to match the seats in these kinds of things), and when she reaches out in front of her to feel out her surroundings, there’s a mesh pocket on the back of the next seat up.

She can’t tell what it is that has Aang so awed, so she’ll have to content herself with the knowledge she can glean this way.

“So how is this one different?” she asks, indulging him. He flips up the armrest to put his arm around her shoulders, which seems romantic (at least it does to the creepily-dedicated denizens of the #beifong/tsering tag on Tumblr), but is really just Aang’s way of letting her know that he’s happy.  
  
(It’s kind of sweet. She’d blow up a bridge before she told him that.)

“Well, it’s really green,” he tells her. “I haven’t seen a big city with this much green right outside the city limits. I mean…I’m not kidding, it’s _so green.”_

“Considering that I’ve never seen the color green, that doesn’t really help me much,” Toph grumbles.

“Plants,” Aang amends, unperturbed. “Super dense plants everywhere.”

“Okay, and?”

“Well, right now we’re going over a bridge,” he tells her. “Over the water. And…I don’t know, I just think it’s pretty.”

“There are bridges everywhere, Aang.”

“Yeah, but this one feels different.”

“Hm. I’m not convinced, but whatever.”

“Anyways. I just…I don’t know. I wish I could actually show you what I meant.”

  
She doesn’t know what else to say, but she finds herself oddly desperate not to let the conversation end. “Have we gone through any tunnels yet?” she asks, even though she can recognize light and dark (she’s _almost_ blind, but she can still make that distinction) and she knows they haven’t.

“Not since the airport,” Aang provides. “There are a few, like, overhangs, but no real tunnels. Why?”

Toph shrugs. “I don’t know, I just wondered,” she says, because, upon further examination of her motivations, she really _doesn’t_ know why she asked. “Still green?”

“More buildings now, but yeah. Real hilly, too, but…kinda flattening out now. It sort of looks like we’re in the suburbs now.”

“So this is the boring part of the trip.”

“Basically, yeah. This part of Seoul looks like it could be anywhere.” Then Toph feels him squeeze her arm again. “Tunnel!”

“Yeah, yeah, I see it,” she replies, secretly pleased that he’d thought to point it out even though it isn’t that surprising.

“…you do?”

“I mean, I can tell,” she corrects, her face growing warm. She hopes he doesn’t notice. “’Cause, you know…light and dark.”

_Please don’t ask any follow-up questions,_ she thinks.

“Oh yeah. I, uh, totally knew that.” Aang tends to forget what she can and can’t see sometimes, which Toph takes pride in; she likes knowing that people are shocked to learn that she’s nearly blind. It feels like a victory whenever someone’s jaw drops at the realization that Toph can’t see, like a mark of successful adaptation to a world designed for people whose perspectives are so radically different than hers – and it feels even more like one when it’s Aang, who’s known Toph since they were six. If she’s good enough to fool him, she figures she’s good enough to fool anyone.

But sometimes it hurts, too, because the easier she makes it for him to forget how that her world looks different than his, the harder it is not to feel disappointed that she can’t experience the same world that he does.

“Right.” She hears him swallow hard. “Well, um…we’re crossing another bridge over water. It’s still pretty green, and kind of hilly again, but…wait, never mind, this looks like the suburbs again. Yeah, this really could be anywhere green. Looks a little like Vancouver, actually.”

“Seriously? Whoever plans these things needs to get more creative if Canada looks the same as Korea.” That’s another thing Toph can’t understand about the aesthetic world she’s never been able to be a part of – if she could see, she’s convinced that she’d want every city to look like its own. Aang has described the same skyscraper-dotted homogeneity to her in every new city they’ve competed in, and though she’s sure there are difference she can’t see, she doesn’t get it. Why would the people who make these decisions squander their precious sight on a whole slew of cities that look exactly the same? Why can’t each city look like it _feels?_ She can certainly _feel_ cities, and their sensations aren’t as samey as Aang says their appearances are. It just doesn’t make any _sense._

As the train slows to a crawl and she steps onto the platform, luggage in one hand and Aang’s hand in the other, e’s almost glad that she doesn’t know things by sight. She doesn’t exactly have a frame of reference to go by, but that kind of thing sure does seem boring.

**

**_Seoul, South Korea_ **

**_Four Continents Figure Skating Championships_ **

**_Day 1: Practice_ **

“Those creepy twins are staring at us again, aren’t they.”

Aang raises his eyebrows, but he’s long past the point of wondering how Toph could possibly know that. If there is anything he’s learned in the ten years of their partnership, it’s that Toph Beifong always has her ways. “Yeah. It’s getting really weird.”

  
Toph smirks. “Let them.”

This, too, is typical Toph. She enjoys psyching out the competition.

“I don’t think they’re really the ones we need to be worrying about,” he mutters under his breath. Eska and Desna Tanuyak, a pair of sullen, sulking twins who might perhaps be the only internationally-competitive figure skaters the state of Alaska has ever produced, are hardly up there with the best in the world. It’s their compatriots, Bolin Wong and Kuvira Zhang, who they really need to be worrying about. Bolin and Kuvira are an odd pair – he’s short, beefy, and cheerful, while she’s sullen, more competitive even than Toph, and nearly as tall as her partner (that’s a massive disadvantage on airborne elements) – but they’re rock-solid under pressure, and easily Aang and Toph’s stiffest competition.

Other than that, though, there’s not much to be said for this field. The third Chinese team here actually placed fourth at Nationals and was thrown a bone with the assignment to the Four Continents Championships – a less-prestigious but still major event between most countries’ Nationals in December and January and the World Championships in March – and they’re not much to worry about. So, unless Canada’s Iknik Varrick and Zhu Li Moon manage to keep themselves together this time (they’re the subject of near-endless rumors – _everyone_ knows they can’t get along to save their lives), they’ve essentially got this one bagged.

Toph still appreciates the element of intimidation, though.

“How are Varrick and Zhu Li looking?” she asks as they stand by the boards in between run-throughs, taking a long chug from her water bottle.

“Decent, surprisingly,” Aang replies. “They’re getting a lot more distance in their throws.”

“Ugh.” Toph has made her disdain for Iknik Varrick abundantly clear since their first meeting at a competition last season when she’d witnessed the pair arguing – loudly, publicly, and acrimoniously – over something that appeared to be entirely his fault but which he was making out as his partner’s doing, even at Zhu Li’s ardent insistence that their flubbed side-by-side jobs had, in fact, been _his_ fault. “Bolin and Kuvira?”

“Back-to-back run-throughs. Both flawless.”

“As expected.” Toph sets down her water bottle and turns to her partner. “We need to establish dominance before they get any ideas-“

“Um, no, we need to work on our lutzes. They’ve been squirrely-“

“Exactly. Because we can’t let them see the chinks in our armor.” Toph cracks her knuckles, probably for effect, and Aang wishes she could see him rolling his eyes. “Ready to drill those suckers?”

“Always,” Aang replies, longsuffering.

**

**_Seoul, South Korea_ **

**_Four Continents Figure Skating Championships_ **

**_Day 2: Short Dance_ **

****

“Oh, hey, I’ve seen you around!”

Toph glances up, curious, when Aang greets someone on their right; she hadn’t exactly been expecting to socialize when she’d agreed to come watch the Short Dance, which is slotted to take place after practice the day before the Pairs Short Program, with her partner.

“Aang?” says whoever Aang greeted – a girl, Toph now knows, whose accent sounds Korean. (Accent recognition, down to the dialect, is another skill she’s picked up over the years; it’s useful for, at very least, recognizing a skater’s nationality when she doesn’t yet know their voice.) “Oh, hello!” 

“Yeah!” Aang sits, and Toph takes the cue to follow. “And I think you’ve met my partner, Toph?”

“Oh, yeah. Hi,” she says, then lapses into the awkward beat of silence that always follows a gesture that Toph doesn’t return.

“Oh, um, if you’re waving or something, I…can’t see.” It never gets any less awkward to explain this. She’s not feeling particularly charitable, so she adds, “and I…don’t actually know who you are.”

“Oh, sorry,” the girl replies. “I…forgot that…”

“I was blind?” Toph crosses her arms. “Yeah, most people do. It’s fine. What’s your name again?”

“On-Ji,” she offers, her voice cooler than it was when she spoke to Aang.

“Oh, right. On-Ji Choi. I remember you.” There’s a lot Toph could say to that but doesn’t. “What brings you here?”

“I just like to watch,” she says. She’s not nearly as open now, which Toph notes with interest – openness means trust, and she obviously trusts Aang. “You?”

“Some of our friends are competing,” Aang replies cheerily, oblivious to the tension between his partner and his acquaintance. “You know Katara and Zuko, right?”

  
“Azula’s brother?” On-Ji asks. It makes sense that she’d latch onto that detail – Azula is her direct competition, after all.

“Yeah, that’s the one. We train together, so we wanted to come out and support them.” Aang knocks his shoulder into Toph’s. “Right, Toph?”

She tries not to think about the interest in On-Ji’s voice now that it’s Aang talking again. “Yeah.” She can’t resist probing. “You two know each other?”

“Yeah, we met at Skate America,” he tells her.

Toph doesn’t bother to restrain her suspicion. “And where was I?”

“Sleeping, I think. I was hanging out in the lounge, reading that book Zuko is always talking about, and On-Ji came by for the elevators and happened to see me-“

“And I recognized the cover,” she finishes. “I read a lot to practice English. I liked that one.”

  
“Oh. Cool.” Toph tucks her knees up to her chest. “Uh…funny that we ran into each other?”

“I know, right?” Aang says before he and On-Ji launch back into an enthusiastic discussion of _The Orchid Society’s_ upcoming movie adaptation, and Toph wonders why she came to this thing at all.

It’s not like she can watch, and what she _can_ see, she wishes she didn’t.

**

**_Seoul, South Korea_ **

**_Four Continents Figure Skating Championships_ **

**_Day 3: Pairs’ Short Program_ **

****

Aang Tsering thinks he might be the only figure skater alive whose answers to the kinds of questions he’s asked after every single competition are entirely and unabashedly true. The questions about trust that reporters too politically correct to bring up Toph’s blindness outright but want to know what it’s like to toss a girl five feet above your head when she can’t see where in the air she is? “Oh, yeah, we trust each other with our lives,” and a winning smile – he means it. _What’s it like to skate with Toph?_ “A privilege,” he tells them, arm around his partner’s shoulders, and it’s true. Sure, it’s all the more daunting to skate with someone who can’t see if she’s going to hit the wall (though twelve years on the ice have taught her to guess at her position relatively effectively) than it might be to skate with someone else, but he cannot imagine doing anything else.

Besides, Toph is _brilliant._ Everyone and their mother knows that. The Chinese Skating Federation knows that, which is the only reason they were bumped to the Senior level so young in the first place – there was no point in eating the other Junior pairs alive anymore, not with the kind of talent and seamless synchronicity they have.

But he still worries about her.

Aang can’t really say why his heart speeds up when he sets his hands on her waist in the setup to a throw jump he’s seen her land flawlessly thousands of times in practice, or why he can’t throw her above his head to rotate in a triple twist without a moment of doubt even though they’ve never flubbed it in competition and, given their athleticism and one-foot-four-inch height difference, it plays to their strengths. He _knows_ that Toph is an absurdly gifted athlete, that he shouldn’t have anything to worry about. But that changes very little.

“We got this,” she whispers in the silent moment before their music begins to play, and he wishes he were as confident as she is.

“We got this,” he repeats anyways.

Music choice is critical during a couple’s Senior debut season – picking the wrong music runs the risk of being branded ‘juvenile’ or, worse, ‘juniorish,’ both descriptors that are irritatingly hard to shake off. Worse still if it goes the other way and the mature, dignified music a team chose, hoping to be perceived as artistic, comes across as an inadvisable reach, a program concept they weren’t yet ready for. Excessive ambition is nearly as deadly in judges’ eyes as the lack thereof, and a new Senior team’s music choice must expertly straddle that line to be well-received. Aang had vouched for the _perfectly classy_ score of a video game he’d recently discovered and been shot down in favor of _Turandot,_ which he’s pretty sure is the exact kind of overt ambition they should be avoiding while they’re still making their mark, but he’d had little say in the matter. Toph had turned traitor because, apparently, she relates to the main character, and after she cast a favorable vote, it had been over for him.

So, _Nessun Dorma_ (among other cuts whose titles he doesn’t know) it must be, though it’s not _them._ Neither is the opening sequence that accompanies the first sweeping violin notes of their music.

It’s all a little too close for comfort, really. Toph stands in front of Aang, back turned, balancing her weight on one toepick while her free leg hooks around Aang’s thigh. In back of her. (This is _not_ a sexy program, and it _isn’t like that,_ Aang insistently explains to anyone who’ll listen – no one thinks it is, given the classical frigidity of the whole thing, but it’s still uncomfortable.) When the music begins, she swings her leg free, using the momentum to turn before extending her leg in an arabesque so that Aang can catch her blade. Again, she balances her weight on the toepick of her skating foot, then rocks back onto the flat of her blade as Aang releases her and her free leg falls to the ice, following her skating leg as it turns out and dips into a brief spread eagle. From there, he takes her hand and they take off, gaining speed as they set up for their throw triple Lutz.

This element usually isn’t a problem. Speed is key in a well-executed throw jump, and, as athletic and muscular as they both are, that’s never been a struggle. Add to that the fact that Toph is one of the shortest women in pairs – which, given the average height of female pairs skaters, is _seriously_ saying something – at 4’ 10”, which makes her unusually aerodynamic without even mentioning her catlike reflexes, and there’s really not much to worry about. (He still does, of course. He doesn’t think he ever _won’t.)_ And this time is no different: they start the throw far enough from the wall that there’s little reasonable risk of an accidental collision, since Toph won’t be able to see where she is when she lands and is always a little disoriented given the distance traveled in the air during throws, and her landing is textbook, free leg high and shoulders back. She barely even _smiles,_ these perfect landings are so routine. In this case, at least, that stoicness suits the program.

There will be no getting dinged for their emotionless interpretation (a frequently-received critique) if it’s supposed to be that way, after all.

_Solid,_ she mouths to him after they rejoin, setting up for their death spiral – perhaps the most deceptively-named maneuver in sports history, given how low-risk it is. He nods, realizing a beat too late that she won’t get anything from that, and diverts his focus to the far more pressing concern of maintaining the speed of the element’s rotation. As he pulls her to her feet, Aang gives her hand a little squeeze in silent reply before they split off again.

Side-by-side jumps are like a tripwire to some teams. Pairs skaters are usually far less proficient jumpers than singles skaters, since more of their score is based on pairs elements like throws and lifts, which often leaves side-by-side jumps vulnerable to mindless mistakes. For Toph, though, they’re as much of a breeze as anything, and Aang has known for as long as he’s known Toph that she won’t let him off the hook if his own aren’t just as reliable. Never mind that they don’t come nearly as easily to Aang as they do to Toph – trouble element or not, he’s got to be on his feet, and reasonably in-sync with her. (That’s an oft-overlooked detail: partners are supposed to synchronize the rotation of their side-by-side jumps.) But there’s no issue today, and the footwork section of their program lets him shake out the nerves a little.

Frankly, they’ve had better step sequences. (They’ve had better _programs._ That is neither here nor there.) This one is about as unoriginal as it gets, cookie-cutter and traditional like the program itself – _“this is what we get for going to a different choreographer,”_ Toph had complained – and Toph already loathes footwork to begin with, so it’s neither partner’s favorite part of the program. At very least, it doesn’t call for overwrought emotion, but it’s really not got much going for it aside from that save the fact that, given its place in a three-minute program packed with elements, it’s mercifully short. The side-by-side spins that follow it are like a sigh of relief, even though neither partner likes spins, either. They’re jumpers, through and through – Toph Beifong took up pairs because she wanted to fly, and Aang Tsering took up pairs because the coaches at his childhood rink thought he’d make a good partner. Spins and footwork and even lifts, really, sometimes feel like unnecessary tedium, hindrances to the things that make pairs skating Pairs Skating.

Like the triple twist: half-lift, half-throw, all explosive energy. It’s another element for which Aang and Toph’s height difference makes them particularly well-suited – he’s tall, with upper-body strength that belies his lean frame, and she’s tiny and aerodynamic and fearless. On several occasions, lacking any visual frame of reference for the element, Toph has asked Aang to figure out the exact height of each of their rivals’ triple twists so that she can compare them to their own, figure out if they’re clearing even the highest of those, but he’s never actually done it. “Ours is definitely the highest,” he always says, because it’s all but impossible to get that data – not that he needs it to be able to tell her where they stand in the pecking order.

It’s no secret that this is Toph’s favorite required element.

  
“That could’ve been a little smoother,” she mutters when he releases her, even though any other pair would’ve been thrilled with it. She’s right – the catch _did_ seem a little crashier than usual – but it’s still a rather ridiculous thing to nitpick when the mistake was nearly imperceptible. Perhaps she’s just trying to give herself a little room for error because their final element, a combination lift, is her least-favorite. Lifts are all about form: when she’s being presented to the audience this way, Toph can’t afford not to look nice. Pointed toes, straightened back despite the strain in every muscle in her core, every ballet lesson she’s been forced to take against her will applied to perfection – detail is everything, and Toph _hates_ detail. Polish, she can do; finesse, she absolutely cannot.

That’s not to say she isn’t usually fine, of course, but it’s the principle of the thing.

“Pretty good, pretty good,” Aang says above the din of applause when the music fades.

Toph shakes her head, though she lets him pull her into his arms, which has to mean he’s doing _something_ right. (Toph is not a touch person.) “Coulda been better, though.”

“Well, yeah, but…good, right?”

“Sure, why not.” She thumps his back with force that a four-foot-nine teenager should not be capable of.

_Oh, she’s happier than she’s letting on,_ he realizes. Violence is Toph Beifong’s love language – if she’s hitting him, she’s pleased.

(He won’t realize for a couple of hours that, given that this isn’t her usual reaction to a performance like that, he doesn’t know why.)

  
  


****

**_**_ **

**_Seoul, South Korea_ **

**_Four Continents Figure Skating Championships_ **

**_Day 5: Pairs’ Free Skate_ **

****

Toph gets the same essential question, rephrased in various, more socially-acceptable ways, from every fan and reporter and broadcaster she runs across.

_How do you skate when you can’t even see?_

She doesn’t think she’s met anyone in her entire career who hasn’t at least wondered, and usually, it doesn’t bother her. Pairs skating is a matter of trust; this just means that she and her partner have to trust each other that much more. All pair girls are life-dependent on their partners, and she’s really no exception. It’s not the answer people are looking for – they want the kind of story that winds up in Chicken Soup for the Soul books and inspiring TV spots about “overcoming adversity” or whatever. But she refuses to give that satisfaction to anyone who thinks that the function of her eyes, or lack thereof, is her only personality trait.

(Never mind that she forcibly conceals every single one of her _actual_ personality traits. People should at least get that she’s sick and tired of being asked Skating While Blind questions carefully phrased not to offend when that’s all they ever do.)

But if she is being honest, it’s not her exceptional talent or the longevity of her partnership or her accommodating coaching staff of even her family’s money that’s let her come so far as a skater. If she were to answer that question truthfully, she’d tell them something she can barely admit to herself.

_It’s all just a matter of having the right partner._

It’s why a free skate that _should_ be a four-minute minefield of potential disasters is, instead, an opportunity to demonstrate why such questions are stupid in the first place. _Isn’t it obvious?_ She wants to shout. As a skater, she trusts her training and her talent, yes, but as a _pairs_ skater, she has to trust her partner – and he’s earned that trust a million times over. She remembers the relentless workout regimen he began to follow when his growth spurt at fourteen hit a little too hard, the way he’d been determined to strengthen his gangly arms even though Toph was tiny enough that he barely needed to, and what he said when she’d asked why.

He’d looked at her for a moment – at least, she likes to imagine he had – and replied, “I can’t take any risks, Toph,” as if it were the most obvious thing in the world.

That’s the secret she’s loath to divulge: gifted or not, she couldn’t do what she does with anyone else. She’s in good hands; for that, she’s all the more determined to make sure that he is, too. And not just to hold her own, or to prove something (as she tells people), or because she _can_ (as she tells herself), but because being his partner means something to her that she doesn’t know if she’ll ever be able to articulate. 

Sitting in the Kiss-and-Cry, her hand in his, he hopes he gets that from the way she risks a rare smile at him when their winning scores flash across the screen.

**

**_Seoul, South Korea_ **

**_Four Continents Figure Skating Championships_ **

**_Day 6, Again: Banquet_ **

****

“Wanna dance?”

Toph crosses her arms. “Wouldn’t you rather dance with On-Ji?” she challenges.

  
This is partly a genuine concern of hers, and partly born of an aversion to public dancing that is not of the frozen-water variety. She doesn’t know how, and the idea of being pulled into a crowd of flailing, overdressed dancers who she cannot see and whose movements are too erratic to predict is something out of a nightmare. True, post-event banquets are usually a little more dignified than that, but she’s still not taking any chances.

“What? Why?” Aang seems as confused as Toph is reluctant. “Why would I?”

“Never mind.” Toph slouches back into her chair, arms still crossed. “You know I don’t dance.”

“I know, but…I can make sure everyone gives you space,” he tells her. “You won’t get stepped on.”

“I’m not worried about getting stepped on.” She pictures a stray elbow erring a little too close to her face, a bandaged nose at her next competition, and grimaces.

“Or your nose broken.”

Toph’s face heats. She _hates_ it when he can’t help but make it glaringly obvious how well he knows her.

“Don’t you want to celebrate?” he changes tactics when he sees that promising safety from bodily harm isn’t working. “Our first ISU Championship win! That’s, like…a big deal, right?”

  
“It’s Four Continents, Aang. Get back to me when we win Worlds.” She knows they won’t, not against the Russian teams that can’t compete at an event for skaters from every continent _but_ Europe (Four Continents is essentially the counterpart of the European Championships), which makes the point all the more clear. “Or even the Grand Prix Final. _Then_ I’ll dance with you. But not-“

“Toph,” Aang cuts her off, bending to take her hands. “You’ve been so tense lately. What’s _actually_ wrong?”

“Nothing!” she snaps, hackles raised. “I just don’t dance!”

“Yeah, but you usually don’t act like you’re going to bite my head off when I ask.” She hears the fabric of his suit rustle and figures he’s probably crouching – when he’s fifteen inches taller than her and she’s seated, it’s the easiest way to talk to her. She bites her lip to keep from saying anything she’ll regret. “Really. Is this about dancing with me or not?”

“I just think you’d have more fun without me,” she says. It’s not the whole truth, but it sounds honest enough to put him off her scent. “Go dance with Lili and Chong or something.”

“Lili and Chong are drunk, Toph.”

“Didn’t know there was a bar here,” she grouses. “Maybe I should-“

“Toph. Underage. Don’t.”

“Do I look like I care?”

“No, but someone’s going to report you if you try.” Aang squeezes her hands. “And I wouldn’t want to dance with those two if they were stone-cold sober.”

“That might be the meanest thing I’ve ever heard you say,” Toph comments, and the idea of sweet, go-with-the-flow Aang roasting their teammates brings her brief but immense amusement. “Wasn’t really that mean, but still. I’m rubbing off on you.”

“You only say that because you’ve never seen them dance,” Aang mutters. “And that’s beside the point.”

“Okay, then find someone else. Ty Lee would dance with you, I’m sure.”

“Ty Lee’s hit on everyone here within two years of her age, Toph.”

  
“Okay, then Zuko and Katara?”

“Slow-dancing to songs that aren’t even slow.” Aang pauses then adds, “and I’m pretty sure they snuck off to make out at least twice.” 

“Seriously?” Toph pulls a face. “Never expected them to be the PDA type.”

  
“Hence the sneaking off.”

“Fine, then. What about On Ji?”

“What is it with you and On Ji?”

“Nothing, but you two sure do seem cozy. Thought you might want to shoot your shot.”

“Shoot my shot?” Aang repeats, audibly confused. “You mean, like…”

“Dude. You _like_ her.”

“Oh, that.” Aang scratches the back of his neck. “Uh, maybe a little?”

“Exactly. Go dance with her.” _Why do I do this to myself?,_ Toph wonders, but she realizes in the space of a few seconds that she’ll never have a good answer to that question and gives up.

  
“Look, I might like On Ji, but she’s not my partner,” he replies. “ _You_ are. And I want to dance with _you.”_

“Fine,” she huffs. “Only one song, though.”

“One song. Got it.”

(She wonders, later that night, if he knew when he agreed to that that she’d end up staying for eight.

She wonders if she noticed how much she wanted to run and stay all at once, and she wonders what that all means.

She wonders if maybe she already knows.)

****


	9. Take On the World(s)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's time for the World Championships! Toph and Aang vlog; Zuko and Katara are soft; commentators are exceedingly annoying.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> HOLY SHIRTBALLS THIS CHAPTER IS 7.6K WORDS. Anyways. I had to cover a LOT of ground here and I knew I'd never finish if I wrote it in straight-up prose, so I decided to have all of the parts that weren't Zuko and Katara-centric in script format. Taang's are like the written version of a vlog (yes, they're making a discount ShibSibs vlog bc those things were my dang CHILDHOOD, shut up), and the ones covering the ladies' event are supposed to be like...the transcription of a broadcast? I know it's kind of amateurish and very experimental, but it was good at condensing large amounts of information into minimal space, and it was fun, so why not? Hopefully that'll make more sense when you actually read it. 
> 
> Also. This brings us to the END of our first season lol what. THREE TO GO! I've already chosen their FD music for next season (and cut it!) but I might need some help coming up with a SD, so if anyone with ice dance knowledge has a favorite pattern, please suggest things! :p 
> 
> Also, there can be no figure skating without Russians, but it would appear that there is no one in AtLA whose heritage could conceivably be analogous to any ethnic group which resides in Russia, so I gave one girl a random name and left the rest of their skaters nameless. Please ignore how awkward this is. Also please ignore the mixing of generations - I had to do that because I was running out of characters. Oops.

HELSINKI

# VLOG: First World Championships! Helsinki 2019 Behind-the-Scenes

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Jan 4, 2019

[Taangouts!:](https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCwrck-lD9ERHLWxWDD8_uyA) Behind the Scenes with Toph Beifong & Aang Tsering

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**_DAY 1-2: Arrival, Practice_ **

****

[Title card. The words “Taangouts!: Behind the Scenes with Beifong & Tsering” in an atrocious bubble font scroll across the screen over a video of TOPH and AANG, wearing practice clothes, falling out of side-by-side jumps in accidental unison. Toph flips to her stomach and raises her legs, crossed at the ankles, behind her, as if this fall was completely intentional, and Aang copies her pose.

Badly-applied iMovie transition. Screen switches to grainy video of the clouds out an airplane window. A hand, two shades too dark to be either Aang’s or Toph’s, waves in front of the camera, which flips around to reveal KATARA NUTARAQ, sleepy but clearly excited in a red Caldera Tech sweatshirt and messy ponytail. She’s turned to the camera, and her partner, ZUKO NISHIMURA, rests his chin on her shoulder from the next seat over.]

**Aang:** [behind the camera] Katara, wanna tell the world where we’re going?

**Zuko:** [sleepily] it’s literally gonna be in the title of the video.

[KATARA reaches back to poke him, then back to the camera. Zuko sighs as if he’s seen far too much.]

**Katara:** [palpably excited] we’re going to Worlds!  
  


[Camera swivels to TOPH, who’s clearly just waking up from a nap.]

**Toph:** weren’t we gonna wait to vlog until we actually got there?

**[The following portion of the original footage has been edited out of the final vlog.]**

**Aang:** did we ever actually agree to that or were you just hoping I wouldn’t get your plane bedhead on camera?

[Toph flips the bird to the camera.]

**Aang:** I’m editing that out.

**Toph:** don’t. It’ll be more authentic with it in.

**Aang:** Toph. _Family-friendly image._ We have young fans!  
  


 **Toph:** that sounds like a you problem.

**[The final vlog picks up again after the previous exchange.]**

**Aang:** so, uh, it kind of just occurred to me that we should probably explain what this video is, so here goes. [Clears throat] I’m Aang Tsering, and this is my partner…

**Toph:** Toph Beifong.

**Aang:** we’ve kind of been talking about doing backstage vlogs for a while, because, well. We’ve gotten up to some crazy stuff at competitions that we think you guys would get a kick out of-

**Toph:** and by that he means that _I_ get up to crazy stuff and _he_ thinks that sneaking extra Keurig pods from the free coffee tray at a hotel in France that one time is wild.

**Aang:** [face reddening] they were _free!_

**Katara:** [offscreen] living dangerously, now are we?

**Aang:** _anyway._ Toph and I have wanted to start vlogging at events for a long time, and since this is our first senior World Championships, we thought that this might be a good time to start!

**Katara:** [offscreen, though the camera shakily pans over when she speaks] ours too!

[Zuko, drifting on again, makes what seems like a ‘yes, that’ sort of noise. Katara glances back at him, still resting on her shoulder, and smiles.]

**Katara:** I think he’s a little jet-lagged.

**Zuko:** [cracking an eye open, less asleep than previously assumed] we’ve been in the air for an hour, Katara. How’s that possible?

**Toph:** ah. He lives!

**Aang:** oh, right. I forgot to mention – this is Katara and Zuko. We train together back in Caldera. [he ignores the fact that anyone watching this thing will likely be a die-hard fan] They’re-

**Toph:** totally disgusting. I mean, look at them.

**Aang:** -from Canada. Dude. _Chill._

**Toph:** am I wrong?

[Cut. Another badly-done iMovie transition. The next clip pans around the competition arena. Pairs in practice clothes move by the camera, most of them too blurry to recognize, though ESKA AND DESNA pause to glare at the camera as they skate by, and a young Russian team whom Aang and Toph competed against often as juniors wave as they pass.]

**Aang:** okay, we gotta be quick about this ‘cause we’re going to get yelled at if we get caught, but I think we can squeeze in a few seconds of film, so-

**Toph:** we’re at practice. [Crosses arms] Normal enough, except that I don’t know where the walls are yet. [Slaps the boards as if they’re in on some kind of joke] Gotta work on that.

**Yangchen:** [off-camera] Aang, what are you doing…?

[Camera shuts off abruptly. Cut to the next clip, which is an unfocused video of nothing aimed at an empty middle section of the rink’s stands.]

**Aang:** [offscreen] hey, guys. It’s officially day two of Worlds-

 **Toph:** and I finally got him to let me film. [Snort-laughs] I don’t even know what I’m pointing the camera at, but I’m pretty sure it’s not the practice we’re supposed to be watching.

**Aang:** she likes to troll me.

**Toph:** no, I just think I have a better eye for aesthetics than you.

**Aang:** right. _[Beat]_ Anyways. We have a few training partners who are on this session, so we came out to support.

**Toph:** no, we came out because there’s literally nothing else to do.

**Aang:** _Toph._

**Toph:** and because Aang is weird like that. _[Beat]_ who’s even on this besides Azula?

**Aang:** _[takes the phone from her]_ well…[zooms in] Suki. She trains with us, too. Then there’s [camera pans over a few feet – miraculously, it manages to focus this time, and catches Azula setting up for a jump] Azula, who Toph just mentioned.

**Toph:** also our training partner.

**Zuko:** [off-camera] and the non-disappointing child in my family.

**Aang:** oh yeah, I forgot. [Pans camera; Katara waves, Zuko glares] they’re here, too.

**Katara:** how’s the vlog coming?

**Toph:** it was better when I was filming.

**Aang:** anyways, to finish answering Toph’s question…[zooms in on each skater] there’s four more in this group. [shaky, blurry close-up of a barely-visible skater] That one is Korra Ayuluk-

**Katara:** [grabs Zuko’s arm] our teammate! [free hand waves at the camera] she’s the best.

**Zuko:** I thought _I_ was the best. [pouts]

**Toph:** see what I mean about them being gross?

**Katara:** [pokes his arm] I can have more than one favorite.

**Aang:** anyways. Then there’s – [another close-up] On-Ji, then Ming-Hua – that’s our teammate – and…someone whose name I can’t remember.

**Toph:** hm. Cool. _[beat, music begins – the waltz from “Spirited Away” is heard in the background, surprisingly faint]_ That’s Suki’s short program, right?

**Aang:** yup. [Zooms in on her, tries to follow her movements from the top of the stands with a phone camera – results are tragic] looking good as usual.

**Katara:** ooh, does my brother have competition?

**Aang:** not like _that._

**Katara:** I’m _kidding,_ Aang.

[Cut.]

**

**_World Figure Skating Championships_ **

**_Helsinki, Finland_ **

**_Day 3_ **

**_Ladies’ Short Program – Television Broadcast_ **

****

[Broadcast company logo flashes across screen – the letters “BSS,” bent over a blue spiral-shaped whorl against a white background. Cut to commentators PIANDAO LIU and JOO DEE CHANG, seated somewhere above the ice; two-time U.S. Ladies’ Champion Joo Dee wears the kind of painted-on smile that earns her no favors with the viewing public, most of whom think she’s creepy. Piandao looks about as enthused to be working with her at yet another event as any member of said public would be.]

**Piandao:** after an exciting day of competition in the Pairs and Men’s short programs, we now come to what many consider to be the crown jewel of these Championships, the Ladies Short Program. [He looks pained – understandably, given the drivel on the teleprompter that BSS’ production team insisted he recite.] Joo Dee, who are you keeping your eye on this year?

**Joo Dee:** [her smile does not waver] well, as always, Azula Nishimura is a force to be _reckoned_ with, but all _three_ of the Japanese ladies could snag a podium spot. [She emphasizes random words, and everything about her is too bright, too upbeat, and too _much.]_ Ty Lee Park has been on her way up – she’s definitely going to be a crowd favorite, if not a _serious contender_ for a medal. The United States’ Asami Sato is _always_ one to _watch,_ the three _Russian_ ladies are all _fantastic competitors,_ and, of course, the Canadian team’s got a contender in Korra _Ayuluk._ [Bright, loud, abrasive laugh] One might even say she’s been Ayu- _lookin’_ good lately!

[Piandao is visibly disgusted. This exchange is going to be a viral gif by the end of the night whether they want it to be or not.]

**Piandao:** thank you, Joo Dee. [Still looks like he hopes he’s hallucinating this entire conversation] Now. The skating order in this short program is seeded by skaters’ rankings based on previous results, so skaters will be grouped with competitors of relatively similar competitive caliber. That means that the two remaining groups in this event are going to be, largely, the most competitive – these two groups of ladies likely have more to lose, and more on the line, but also much more to gain than the previous three groups.

**Joo Dee:** and we’re going to head off Group _Four_ with China’s Ming-Hua _Tiong_ …

[It is at this point that a dreadfully bored Sokka Nutaraq, watching at home without the slightest knowledge of the fact that his sort-of girlfriend won’t skate for another hour, consults a skating order, rolls his eyes at the commentators and flicks off the television. He’ll be back when there’s something to watch.

He returns at the beginning of Group Five. Six names – Tsumura Suki, Nishimura Azula, Park Ty Lee, two Russians whose names he doesn’t care to learn, and Korra Ayuluk – flash across the screen in skating order as their owners skate in and out of the picture behind the oversized graphic that takes up most of the ice onscreen.]

**Joo Dee:** [voiceover] this is really _such_ a _competitive_ group of skaters. Any _one_ of these ladies could potentially medal, and it’s _quite likely_ that every single _one_ of this year’s _medalists_ will come from _this group._ I can’t _wait_ to see how it all _shakes out!_

[Skaters are called off of the ice at the end of their warmup, leaving only PARK TY LEE on the ice. It is a running joke among skating fans that Ty Lee must always wear at least one pink costume per season; this year it’s a plunging v-neck dress in pale pink with cap sleeves that match its petal-delicate skirt and more beading than fabric in some places.]

**Piandao:** now, this seventeen-year-old has been the name on everyone’s lips since her breakout win at last year’s World Junior Championships, and so far her first senior season has been fairly consistent with that start. But-

**Joo Dee:** you never know who’ll _crac_ k under the _pressure_.

**Piandao:** skating to Edith Piaf’s “Hymne a L’amour,” here is…[the briefest of pauses for effect] South Korea’s Ty Lee Park.

[They fall silent for the first few seconds of her program; it doesn’t last.]

**Joo Dee:** she’s got a triple flip-triple _toe loop_ planned _first_.

**Piandao:** Ty Lee has notoriously squirrely edges, so she’ll want to make sure that the first jump of this combination takes off on a clear inside edge to avoid an edge call. [Beat; they watch her as she sets up for the jump] Hard to tell in real time if that edge was good, but that was beautifully-landed.

**Joo Dee:** her technique isn’t the _stronges_ t, but she’s such a crowd-pleaser! Just _look_ at that _flexibility._ [They pause to give the audience time to admire Ty Lee’s combination spin, which seems to take as much flexibility as some circus contortion acts.]

**Piandao:** her presentation scores are consistently the highest in this group, as well.

**Joo Dee:** moves like a _dancer_.

**Piandao:** watch that transition into her double axel – that’s an extremely difficult foot position to take off from. [She pushes off her back foot to launch into an easy double axel from a layback Ina Bauer.] that’ll bring up her Grade of Execution for the element.

**Joo Dee:** many of the top skaters _save_ their jumps for the end of the _program_ to rack up extra _points_ , but Ty Lee has only _one_ left for the second half. That’ll be her triple _lutz_ , right at the _end_ of the program.

 **Piandao:** Ty Lee has talked about strategizing her program layouts to create the most effective performance rather than…I think ‘milking it for points’ were her exact words, and this is an example of that. She recently stated in an interview that the jumps in this program were placed wherever they best fit the music.

**Joo Dee:** it might be a bit _questionable_ from a points standpoint, but you can’t ever _accuse_ her of lacking _commitment_ to her performance. [Beat] again, look at the flexibility in that layback spin – it’s _unparalleled._

**Piandao:** it truly is. Notice how that step sequence has the crowd in the palm of her hand – not a lot of them can do that. Not a lot of _skaters_ can do that.

**Joo Dee:** and that was a _lovely_ triple _loop_ to round out this program!

**Piandao:** I don’t know what more she could’ve wanted from that. [Ty Lee steps off, embraces her coach at the boards, slips on her skate guards, and takes her seat in the Kiss-and-Cry.] She certainly looks satisfied.

**Joo Dee:** _and_ she certainly must _feel_ satisfied after a score like _that!_ Seventy-four point nine-three is a personal best…

**

HELSINKI

# VLOG: First World Championships! Helsinki 2019 Behind-the-Scenes

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Jan 4, 2019

[Taangouts!:](https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCwrck-lD9ERHLWxWDD8_uyA) Behind the Scenes with Toph Beifong & Aang Tsering

8.3K subscribers

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****

[Screen opens on a title card reading “Day Four!” in the same ridiculous bubble font as the opening screen. Cut to video: walking through the hotel lobby, Aang trains his phone camera on Toph. She is still wearing her steel-blue short program dress under a Team China jacket.]

**Aang:** [off-camera] we just finished our short program!

**Toph:** are you pointing a camera at me?

**Aang:** …how’d you even know that?

**Toph:** [glares] don’t I always? 

**Aang:** yeah, true. [beat] so…how’re you feeling? What’d you think?

**Toph:** [the slightest of smiles] pretty good, not gonna lie. I’m happy with that.

**Aang:** as you should be. [Whispers, behind the camera] she was amazing.

**Toph:** [sheepish, trying not to blush] shut up.

**Aang:** we’re, like…a third of the way through now? [pauses] um…everyone’s had their short program except the ice dancers, so…yeah, pretty much. Wait, no, that’s half-

**Toph:** what he means to say is that we’re, like, pretty far in. [Shrugs] I dunno. Time is a social construct.

**Aang:** honestly, yeah. It’s flying by. It’s kinda hard to believe that we’re going to be heading back home in, like, four more days.

**Toph:** must you be so depressing?

**Aang:** oh? Are you admitting that you’re _enjoying_ this?

**Toph:** what, like that’s a surprise?

**Aang:** [a pause that feels heavier than it should be] yeah. Actually, it kind of is.

**

**_World Figure Skating Championships_ **

**_Helsinki, Finland_ **

**_Day 5_ **

****

Maybe the stories that matter look a little like this.

Maybe they don’t look like two people finding each other a little too late – maybe they look like two people realizing that “too late” is what one makes of it.

Maybe they don’t look like the intersection of apathy and apprehension - maybe they look like the kind of safety of knowing you’ll be caught when you fall and spurred onwards when you want to remain in place.

Maybe they don’t look like decades of partnership – maybe they look like potential, something that’s still being built, something that could _become_ lifelong with time and work and patience.

Maybe they look a little like gratitude, “thank you” mouthed unmistakably in the quiet before the music begins. Maybe they look like hands in hands as two people who never expected to find what they have wait their turn to show the world that they’re not ready to call it a day quite yet. Maybe they look like the irrepressible smile of a girl who’s finally doing what she’s dreamed of all her life.

Maybe they look a little like a hip roll and a trumpet call.

Thrilled as she is to be here, Katara can’t deny that she’s nervous, too, and she knows that Zuko is even more so. There’s a little more stiffness in their knees – not just Zuko’s this time – than there usually is, because this rapt arena, even if not filled to capacity, is the largest and most course-determining stage either of them has ever been on. He can see it behind her smile, however genuine; she can feel the stiffness in his hands when he sets them at her waist and shoulder. But it’s just one rapid heartbeat, then two, then three, before the music begins and it no longer matters – there’s little time to think about that now.

Maybe, the way Zuko has to bite his lip so he won’t smile and break character when she gives him a flirtatious little shove with a palm to his chest, there’s little _need_ to.

They begin with the Finnstep pattern, and it would be pointless now to try to count the hours that they’ve invested in it now that they’re here. What they’ve done has obviously been enough to get them here; now they must simply do what they’ve already proven they can, and Katara finds the energy in her reserves, through the rise and fall and bounce and slide of the steps, to flash a smile to the judging panel as they pass it by. It is more critical than ever that each edge and cross and turn and foot position is perfect today – no one puts a foot wrong in the stories that matter – but she cannot bring herself to fret when she’s been waiting for this moment her entire life.

Sometimes, she realizes, the end of a long wait for something that was never a foregone conclusion to begin with brings more than relief than pressure. She can count on her training, on her partner (even as he swings her over his shoulders, even in that terrifying millisecond in which she cannot see the ice and part of her wants to balk the way she did _then)_. She can count on the steadiness of her own feet beneath her.

She can count on Zuko’s stiff knees to cost them points, true, but that hardly seems as important right now as the fact that they are _here,_ and they are _actually_ doing this, and it’s…not imploding. Sure, there’s the slightest wobble to the exit of her twizzles, and she hears the distinctive _snik_ of a blade skidding out of a turn during their midline step sequence, but it’s so much harder not to _smile._

It’s hardly a perfect program, hardly the best that’ll be skated tonight, or anywhere near it. They both know that. But maybe it doesn’t _need_ to be.

This is the beginning.

“Thank you,” she pants, almost laughing without knowing why. His palms press at her shoulders, a warm and solid weight she’s come to love without realizing she has.

“All I did was show up,” he laughs, and she cannot exactly pull him down by the collar to kiss him like she wishes she could in front of an audience of this size, but she manages a barely-there kiss to the first bare patch of skin she can find, his shoulders blocking her movements from the audience’s view.

“No,” she says, and though they have to let go to present to the audience and skate off, she looks back at him. “You didn’t.”

He squeezes her hand, then raises it to present to the audience. “I contest that,” he says, and his eyes sparkle the way they haven’t since New Year’s Eve when they meet hers.

67.92 is hardly a world-record score – it’s certainly not one to inspire the sort of Kiss-and-Cry reaction that winds up going viral.

But maybe the stories that matter don’t always have to start with a bang.

**

**_World Figure Skating Championships_ **

**_Helsinki, Finland_ **

**_Day 6_ **

**_Ladies Free Skate_ **

****

[Camera opens on the BSS logo, which fades out to show the last warm-up group of the Ladies Free Skate. They are like ants from this distance, which is probably the point. Then, the camera cuts to PIANDAO and JOO DEE – still as disgruntled and as plastic-faced as ever.]

**Piandao:** after a shocking upset of the Russian favorites by two upstart Chinese teams in the Pairs Free Skate, we return to Finland and the World Figure Skating Championships for the Ladies Free Skate. Zhang and Wong’s title, and Beifong and Tsering’s surprise silver medal in their senior World Championships debut, took us all by surprise – Joo Dee, do you think we might be looking at a similar upset in this jam-packed field?

**Joo Dee:** [same plasticky smile] _well,_ Piandao, as you can _see,_ the scores at the top are _tight._ [A graphic displaying the results of the Ladies Short Program flashes across the screen.] We’ve got two of the heavily favored _Russian_ skaters in _first_ and _third,_ and the only thing holding back a _podium sweep_ after the short was a _knockout performance_ from Japan’s leading _lady,_ Azula _Nishimura._ With the _third_ of the Russians in _fourth place,_ any _missteps_ on her part will likely result in a _sweep_ the likes of which we haven’t seen in _years-_

**Piandao:** [he is very done with this] but, as you can see, only four points separate first place from eighth. Azula Nishimura is only point-four points out of first, and only half a point separates third and fourth – not to mention that the fifth through eighth place scores are within three points of each other. Ty Lee Park is only a point off the podium, sitting in fifth after the short, and Suki Tsumura, Korra Ayuluk, and Mai Uchida aren’t far behind at all. We could see just about any combination of the top eight on the podium – maybe even the top nine, with the skate that U.S. Champion Asami Sato just had. [A little less done than usual, now that Joo Dee’s been silent for a few moments] I have a feeling that this is going to be one of the most exciting final flights at a World Championship in years.

[Pause; skaters exit the ice. Camera zooms in on Suki, who adjusts the cobalt-blue mesh of her dress and shakes out her feet in the moment before her name is called.]

**Joo Dee:** Suki Tsumura of Japan, who’s in _sixth_ after the _Short Program,_ is _first_ to skate in this final _group._ [Graphic showing the skate order pops up onscreen.] She’ll be _followed_ by heavy _favorite_ Sofia _Kereva_ , then by her _training mate_ Ty Lee Park, with the two other _Russians_ skating _second_ and third to _last_ and her compatriot, _Azula Nishimura,_ rounding out the group.

**Piandao:** skating to music from _Final Fantasy_ by Nobuo Uematso-

**Joo Dee:** _Final Fantasy **Six,**_ Piandao.

**Piandao:** is…there a difference?

[Joo Dee, offscreen, scoffs.]

**Joo Dee:** Suki Tsumura’s greatest _strength_ is the height and _rotation_ of her jumps, but it’s not _just_ the _athleticism_ that sets her apart.

**Piandao:** regardless, hopefully we’ll get a demonstration of that…height and rotation…in this opening triple-triple combination. [Pause; it should be a crime to speak over Suki Tsumura’s triple Lutz-triple toe loop, and Piandao knows this] Excellent start.

**Joo Dee:** as I was _saying,_ it’s not just those _lovely_ jumps that make her _stand out._

**Piandao:** she’s also a good spinner, and she’s got a polish to her skating that’s becoming increasingly-

**Joo Dee:** no, _Piandao,_ I meant her _charisma._

**Piandao:** …rare. [He would like to throw Joo Dee out of the commentator’s box.] And…that too, I suppose. She’s a very, erm…accessible skater.

**Joo Dee:** but the _jumps_ don’t hurt, _either._ [Beat] following up with a _lovely_ triple _flip._

**Piandao:** notice the difficult transitions into her jumps – those are an effective way for skaters to rack up execution points.

 **Joo Dee:** she has such nice _classic_ spin positions. [sniffs] None of the _contortions_ we see so often nowadays. It’s _figure skating,_ not a _circus._

**Piandao:** yes, ehrm. Suki is an, um…a very _textbook_ sort of skater. High, airy jumps; nice position; clean, elegant lines and spins; solid edgework. She’s sort of the classic 1990s “golden age” skater, if you will. [Beat] nice running edge out of that triple salchow.

**Joo Dee:** I always find her so _refreshing._

**Piandao:** [insincere] that she is, Joo Dee, that she is.

**Joo Dee:** looks like the _back_ end of that double _axel-_ triple _toe loop_ combination might’ve been a little bit _underrotated._ [Laughs] But you know what they say! There _are_ no underrotations in the _final group!_

**Piandao:** [ _up to **here** ] _well, no one says that, but I bet the tech panel wishes that they could! [forced laugh] That sure would make life easier for the caller.

[Commentary, usually, is not edited; however, BSS Networks, LLC made the executive decision to cut the following portion from the broadcast:]

**Joo Dee:** oh, hardly. It’s Long _Feng_ today. He _never_ calls them.

**Piandao:** [under his breath] _Joo Dee. Not supposed to say anything controversial, remember?_

**Joo Dee:** what? I’m a commentator! It’s my _job_ to be honest!

**Piandao:** no, it’s your _job_ to suck up to the network so you won’t _lose_ your job!

[In the meantime, our fearless commentators have missed two jumps – a triple loop and a second double axel, both clean – and a spin. At this point, the commentary proceeds, unedited.]

**Joo Dee:** this is _exactly_ the kind of _consistency_ we’ve come to _expect_ from Suki Tsumura.

**Piandao:** last jumping pass coming up, right out of the step sequence – a triple flip-double loop. That’s an ambitious last element to attempt – it’ll likely make or break this performance.

**Joo Dee:** all she has to _worry_ about after this is a _choreographic sequence_ and one final _spin._ If she can _hit-_

**Piandao:** and she _does!_ [laughs, happier that she’s gone clean than he wants to let on] so many fans assumed that her National title back in January was a fluke, but if anything, this goes to show exactly why it wasn’t. That’d give anyone a run for her money!

**Joo Dee:** _wow,_ what a _skate_ for the Japanese National _Champion!_ I wouldn’t be the _least_ but surprised if _that_ put her on the _podium!_

**Piandao:** that’s going to be a tough act for Ty Lee Park to follow. [They pause, both laughing as Suki all but tackles her coach in excitement when she reaches the Kiss-and-Cry.] It’s not just anything that can get a hug out of Kyoshi Yukano – teammate Mai Uchida’s clean skate earlier didn’t, so we’ll see if either of their training partners can, ah, do the same.

[Scores are displayed; Suki claps a hand over her mouth, muffling an ecstatic shriek]

**Joo Dee:** that’s _easily_ the highest score of the _night._ We’ll see how _long_ her lead _holds._

**Piandao:** it may not after this performance, though I can’t really say. Ty Lee Park had a knockout Short Program, but she’s known to be a little less solid in the Free Skate – we’ll see how that shakes out.

[Camera zooms in on Ty Lee – her nervousness is evident on her face, which is a little more pinched than usual.]

**Joo Dee:** she’ll be skating to _selections_ from _Don Quixote._ Let’s _hope_ she’s not just _striking at windmills_ in trying to go up against _that!_

**Piandao:** [flatly] you’re a cutup, Joo Dee.

[Neither says much until her triple flip-triple loop combination goes…somewhat sideways. And into the boards.]

**Piandao:** oh, that’ll be a costly loss of points on that combination. 

**Joo Dee:** looks like she just didn’t get her _spacing_ quite right. It’s _natural_ when you have to follow a skate like _that._

[They’re quieter this time, offering only vague sounds of sympathy or occasional comments when something really merits one.]

**Piandao:** well, you’ve got to give her credit for that. Adding a combination onto one of the last jumps into the program – that takes guts.

**Joo Dee:** [uncharacteristically reserved] spins and footwork are lovely as always.

[Neither of them wants to speak over the replays of the program, either. Neither says anything until Ty Lee steps off.]

**Piandao:** well, looks like she got that hug from Kyoshi, after all.

[Everyone in the know knows what that means. Ty Lee looks like she’s going to cry. Everyone, Piandao and Joo Dee included, is relieved when her fifth-place marks fade from the screen and the camera pans from the Kiss-and-Cry to the ice, where the Russian skater who’d been sitting in third is waiting to be called.]

[The two Russians, skating back-to-back, slot into first and third; Suki retains second position. The camera cuts to the top three Suki waiting for her final results in a backstage lounge; in second place with one skater remaining, she realizes that she’s guaranteed a medal and visibly tries to contain her excitement for her training mate’s sake as Azula takes the ice.]

**Piandao:** Tsumura certainly seems to like those marks. [Chuckles] we won’t have a Russian sweep today, but just how close we get to one is all going to depend on Azula Nishimura. [Beat; she gets into position] This program’s an intense one – kind of fitting, don’t you think?

**Joo Dee:** well, _she’s_ an intense _skater,_ so it _works._ [Laughs – it’s as plasticky as her smile] This has been one of the most _acclaimed_ free skates this _season –_ it’s, uh, Symphony no. 5 by Sh…Sh-

**Piandao:** Dmitri Shostakovich.

**Joo Dee:** right. [music begins – the camera follows Azula as she takes off almost immediately, rapidly gaining speed.] She’s one of _only_ two _ladies_ here today who’s _opening_ with a _triple_ axel instead of a _double._

**Piandao:** it’s been consistent this season, but it did run off on her at the Japanese National Championships, so we’ll see how she fares here. [Beat – she sets up, her jaw visibly set with determination, and takes off. Piandao lets out a _very_ unprofessional half-muffled shriek when her landing is flawless.] _Beautiful!_

**Joo Dee:** I would expect nothing _less_ from Azula Nishimura, but it’s _still_ a pleasant _surprise_ every _time!_

**Piandao:** I’ve often noticed that Azula’s first jump sets up the rest of the program – let’s hope that’s what we’re seeing here.

**Joo Dee:** you really get the sense that this music is _boosting_ her. [Long pause; she’s barely willing to talk over a performance this intense] Oh, she’s on _fire_ tonight.

**Piandao:** there may be underrotations in the final group, but there sure isn’t any room for error in a field like this, and I think she knows that. [Beat] look at the way she throws herself into that triple flip-triple toe loop. That would be most skaters’ most difficult element, and here she is throwing two triple-triples _and_ a triple axel – you don’t see this every day.

**Joo Dee:** and she has such _polish._ [She returns, as always, to her favorite word.] _Everything_ about her skating is _refined_ and _well-packaged._

**Piandao:** she’s like a hurricane in mesh and Swarovski.

**Joo Dee:** [far too cheerily] leaves no one standing!

**Piandao:** that certainly seems to be what she’s doing tonight. Look at the control even in the tiny movements of her step sequence – it’s so clear that her team hasn’t left any stones unturned. She’s so powerful, but she almost moves like an ice dancer in moments like this.

**Joo Dee:** it must run in the family!

**Piandao:** because-

**Joo Dee:** her brother! He’s…[sighs, realizes her joke sailed straight over Piandao’s head] an ice dancer.

**Piandao:** oh. [Sheepish] Right. That he is.

[They lapse into silence by the time Azula checks out of her final spin, and though the crowd is louder than it’s been all night, they don’t have anything to add. There really _is_ nothing to add; even Azula is smiling, and though she doesn’t get a hug from Kyoshi, there’s a pat on the back in store after that skate.]

**Piandao:** I wager that answers the question of how many Russians are going to make it on this year’s World Championships podium.

**Joo Dee:** just _one._ Whoever would have _thought?_

**Piandao:** and what a-

[Cut off abruptly by the announcement of Azula’s scores. They’re not a world record, but they’re close enough to send a gasp through the crowd, and though her smug smile nearly always stays on, now it almost seems genuine.]

**Piandao:** would you look at _that!_

**Joo Dee:** _absolutely_ deserved! What a night for Team Japan!

**Piandao:** and what a season for Suki Tsumura!

[They chatter on inanely as a graphic listing scores and rankings pops up over the now-empty ice onscreen: Azula’s first, of course, followed by Sofia Kereva, then Suki, the two remaining Russian skaters, Korra Ayuluk and Asami Sato with barely a point’s separation, Mai in eighth and a dejected Ty Lee in ninth.

Cut to replays of the pairs event which have been shown at every possible opportunity, no matter how irrelevant.]

**

**_World Figure Skating Championships_ **

**_Helsinki, Finland_ **

**_Day 7_ **

**_Free Dance_ **

****

“Eleventh’s not bad, you know.”

It seems an odd thing for Katara to mention in the last moments before the beginning of the most important skate of their lives. “No,” Zuko agrees. “But why?”

“I mean, objectively, top fifteen isn’t bad. But also…” she smiles knowingly. “Wishing number.”

The stories that matter never mention this – that sometimes the moments with the most riding on them feel small. “Oh yeah. You better wish I don’t go stiff on you again,” he replies, and that’s all he can get in before the music begins.

When this program had begun its life, its story had been a crutch, something he’d had to create to talk himself into the kind of performance he doubted he was really capable of giving. He’d imagined that himself losing his grip on someone beloved because he’d not known what else to think, how else to convince himself that he felt what he should about a program that made him feel nothing. But he’d stopped needing it about as soon as he’d realized that what he felt for Katara wasn’t going away anytime soon.

_Krone_ had started to change shape soon after that.

Before, she’d been someone precious being lost; now, she is someone too precious to lose. He’d pretended to fight for her in one way back then and doesn’t have to pretend to fight for her in another now – not because what they have is a struggle but because the sport she’s chosen to love and the man who might someday earn the same honor are, unfortunately, somewhat incompatible. Skating – not just the _doing_ part, but the _loving_ it takes to commit one’s entire life to a sport this way – is a struggle for him in a way that it never has been for Katara. He can’t step on the ice without fighting an urge to throw in the towel; skating has never shown him much clemency – not his partners, not his coaches, not the judges or even his own natural inclinations – and some days he wonders why he bothers after so long. But _she_ is reason enough to do just about anything, and he wishes he could tell her that it’s no longer just obligation that gets him up in the morning.

She makes the fight worthwhile, but she makes it _easier,_ too, because passion, apparently, can be absorbed by osmosis.

He’s never told her this, but he isn’t putting himself in the place of the man watching the love of his life slip away anymore. Somewhere along the line, he stopped needing that pretense at all, because the love of his life is no longer an abstract entity and now that she’s _right here,_ the only thing he risks losing his grip on is the chance to be the partner she deserves.

He realizes what that means midway through their serpentine step sequence.

_I love her,_ he thinks, and he has to do his best not to trip out of a rocker because the realization hits him like a semi-truck to the face. _Of course I do. How long have I not been able to see it?_

_  
How could I possibly have missed it?_

This is most decidedly not the time for such thoughts, but he barely cares. He’s pretty sure that the difference between this and their other performances of this free dance will be visible on camera if only for the look of sheer, dumbstruck shock and awe that he can’t fight off of his face. Nothing seems to be in his control right now, and yet his hands are steady as ever in hold and in lifts and his knees aren’t any stiffer than they usually are. Sure, he’s all but forgotten where he is, but what does it matter? _Nothing_ matters now. Nothing but this, and _her,_ and finishing this program strong so she can have the World Championships debut she’s dreamed of since childhood and _he_ can inform her of this shocking but not at all unwelcome mid-program revelation.

But, apparently, words still aren’t his friends, and he can’t bring himself to spit it out even when she clings to him after the music fades out.

“We did good,” she says, and he still cannot say it, but his mind has other ideas, apparently, and it’s determined not to let him think them over at all before it turns them into words.

“Katara,” he says, barely aware of what he’s saying. “I wanna kiss you.”

She laughs softly. “I do too, but…people.”

“Can I kiss you?”

“ _Zuko._ Do you have any idea how many people are watching us right now?”

“…can I?”

“Hey, _you’re_ the one with the thing about PDA, not me.”

“…so I can kiss you?”

“ _Please,”_ she says, light and airy and buoyant, and he tries and _tries_ to keep things brief and subtle but he’s just too _happy_ not to give her the kind of kiss she _deserves._

(This is going to be all over the internet tomorrow. He does not care. He _loves_ her.

He thinks it’s worth the risk.)

**

HELSINKI

# VLOG: First World Championships! Helsinki 2019 Behind-the-Scenes

80,218 views

Jan 4, 2019

[Taangouts!:](https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCwrck-lD9ERHLWxWDD8_uyA) Behind the Scenes with Toph Beifong & Aang Tsering

8.3K subscribers

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****

[Title card, as usual, appears, hideous bubble font and all: “Gala Practice!”, because Aang is fond of exclamation points. This segment of the vlog is a timelapse and little bit more stream-of-conscious: the camera is set on a wall, so skaters pass it by at random, and a choreographer yelling in a thick, vaguely Eastern European accent can be heard in the background. Some stop and wave; Katara blows it a kiss. Something vaguely resembling the choreography of the group number which will open the exhibition gala starts to take shape in front of its stationary lens in the space of the two-minute timelapse. Cut to another clip of the gala practice. TOPH points the camera, which Aang has kindly switched into selfie mode without being asked, at herself.]

**Toph:** so apparently we have to switch partners with another pairs team for this-

[BOLIN, one of the two newly-crowned World Pairs Champions, skates by, notices TOPH filming, and peers around her shoulder to get his face onscreen.]

**Toph:** speak of the devil.

**Bolin:** hey!

**Toph:** [shrugs] you try letting your main rival throw you around when you’re _blind._

**Bolin:** [shrugs in return] well, I _did_ tell them it was a bad idea. [Tips his head in a ‘what-can-you-do’ gesture] the choreographer said I was just afraid that you’d injure me if I dropped you and warned me not to risk it.

**Toph:** good advice. You should take-

[Aang takes the phone from Toph’s hands, soon it shows his face instead of hers, though he quickly flips the camera around to reveal Zuko and Katara standing by the boards nearby, deep in conversation. He zooms in.]

**Aang:** and here we have two overnight sensations-

**Toph:** [from a ways off] give that _back!_

**Aang:** we had a deal!

**Toph:** oh, really?

**Aang:** …that you wouldn’t bully people in our vlogs if I let you film sometimes?

**Toph:** but did you really expect me to go along with that?

**Aang:** no, but a guy has to hope!

**Toph:** oh, just go flirt with your _replacement partner_ or something!

**Kuvira:** [a ways off] I _heard_ that. [Aang turns the camera to face her; her arms are crossed, and she looks infinitely more terrifying in head-to-toe black practice clothes than she does in her competition dresses.] And you better _not._

**Aang:** uh…I’m _sixteen._

**Kuvira:** good.

[Aang finally turns the camera back to Zuko and Katara.]

**Aang:** hey, guys! How’s it feel to have a gif of yourselves on Buzzfeed?

**Zuko:** [alarmed] wait, _what?_

**Aang:** the kiss gif? That thing is _everywhere._

[Zuko looks ill.]

**Zuko:** how are we even popular enough for that?

**Aang:** uh…well, you-

**Katara:** aren’t, but a viral trend is a viral trend. [she laughs and thumps Zuko’s back, though it looks more like the Heimlich than a friendly pat.] It’s not what I expected, but why not?

[The gala choreographer claps. Camera abruptly turns off.]

**

**_World Championships_ **

**_Helsinki, Finland_ **

**_Post-Event Banquet_ **

****

****

“Zuko, you’re, uh…staring.”

“I know.” _Well, at least he’s self-aware,_ Katara thinks, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear self-consciously. She’s wearing her New Year’s Eve dress again for the World Championships banquet, both for practical and symbolic purposes, and though this is the effect she’d been hoping for, it’s still a little startling. “Well, uh…you…look great too, if it, um, helps at all?”

_When did I get so nervous around a guy I just kissed in front of thousands of people?_ She can’t help but think.

“Uh, thanks?”

_…really? Really?_

They enter the ballroom where the banquet is being held on each other’s arms, a little out of their depth even though they’ve both been to countless post-event banquets before. This one is by far the largest and most elaborate one that either has ever attended – even the ones at Junior Worlds didn’t rival this, and the room is _packed._ Katara is grateful for a moment that no one is on the lookout for the eleventh-place ice dance team, because she’s already in overdrive trying to process the spectacle – the buffet that seems to extend the entire length of the ballroom, the dozens of skaters milling around, the thumping Scandinavian electropop from the DJ’s booth that she cannot escape no matter where she goes – and she doesn’t know what she’d do if anyone tried to talk to her.

“This,” Zuko decides after they both stand goggle-eyed in the doorway for a moment, “is insane.”

“Agreed.”

He gestures to an arched doorway that she hadn’t seen. “Looks like the balconies are open. Do you wanna…?”

She nods weakly. “Fresh air sounds nice,” she admits, holding his arm just a little tighter as they make their way through the loose clusters of skaters with their heads down so as not to draw any eyes. Stepping onto the deserted balcony is more of a relief than she wants to admit; she takes Zuko’s hand, and they lean against the railing, their hands sitting intertwined atop it.

“What a week, huh?” is all she can think to say.

“No kidding.” He turns to her, flashing the dimples she wishes she saw more often. “First Worlds _and_ we’re apparently all over the internet.”

“Top fifteen,” she says, though it’s hard for her to disguise the slight disappointment in her voice – Zuko knows she’d wanted to crack the top ten. “We had a great run, didn’t we?”

“We did.” He squeezes her hand. “And…I guess I kinda…realized something.”

She angles her shoulders towards him. “What was it?”

He bites his lip sheepishly to hide a smile, looks down to hide a blush, but doesn’t pull away.

“In the middle of our free dance, it, uh,” he starts, still not looking at her. “It kinda hit me that, um.”

She takes his other hand to keep it from fidgeting, holds both gently. “Yeah?”

He peers up through doelike lashes to meet her eyes.

“I know this is sudden and probably too soon and it might freak you out but it’s been four months now, plus more of just training, and, um…” he pauses, then continues at a squeeze of his hands. “I…I think I love you.”

She freezes, just as he’d feared she would. “I’m…I’m sorry,” he mutters.

But then she _doesn’t._

Then her lips start to quirk up at the edges, so slowly he can barely tell until her smile spans her whole face, and one of her hands frees itself from his and cups his cheek.

“Zuko,” she murmurs. “Don’t _ever_ apologize for that.”

“But-“

“Do you…do you really think that I don’t…I don’t love you too?”

“Uh…”

She pushes herself up on her toes to match his height and kisses him before he can get in another word, which is probably for the best.

It’s not like he _has_ any.


	10. It Takes Two

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> With the start of the second of the four seasons that this story is going to cover, I just thought you should know that you guys are awesome. I hope I can give you a story worth coming back every Saturday for. <3 
> 
> Also, scene 4 brought to you by Zutara Twitter's recent HayleyNFoster animatic-induced meltdown. 
> 
> Also-also: music for this season:  
> SD: a shortened version of this https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9X2ZhjETPRs  
> FD: this! Cut to length: https://youtu.be/PSkahe9O8Eg [story-wise, this juxtaposition of cuts makes NO sense, but idc I love them]
> 
> Season notes:   
> 1) the pattern dance is the Tango Romántica, because i switched the 2018-19 (TR) and 2019-20 (Finnstep) pattern dance requirements for some reason. This is AU 2019-2020 season minus COVID.   
> 2) the name of the first segment of ice dance competition was changed from “short dance” to “rhythm dance” in 2018-19. I was late to the game, so it changes in 2019-20 here.

**Caldera Cricket Club**

**May**

Zuko sometimes wonders why he chose ice dance in the first place.

Sure, he knows the reasons on paper. But that hardly seems to explain why he chose to dedicate his life to something that feels so diametrically opposed to his personality: stiff, closed-off, wary. He’s been called ‘overdramatic,’ but he’s hardly a performer. He hates off-ice dancing. The detail in each placement of his blades, the balancing act of keeping a partner, the trust called for by a sport which prominently features partners being tossed around with knives on their feet – it isn’t like him. It isn’t _natural,_ and every single partner who’s left him over the years knows that.

He wonders, in the sappy moments he’s none too proud of, if he chose it back then for no reason so that he could find that reason now.

“You need a firm stance, Zuko,” Iroh instructs, tapping his back in their now-age-old gesture for “shoulders up.” “Feet wider. You’re the balance here, so you have to plant yourself.” He complies. “Good. Now you need one arm back behind you, like…” Iroh takes his forearm, straightens it, adjusts the way he holds his hand. “This, and the other one is going to be on Katara’s back.”

All fine and good, except that Katara’s been waiting by the boards as Iroh works with Zuko, so he gestures for her to come over.

“Now, you remember your ending pose from that Feeling Good exhibition?” Iroh asks. “This is something like that.”

Katara nods. “Like…” she leans into her partner, one arm around his back for balance, and then hooks her leg around Zuko’s thigh once she’s steadied herself. “This?”

“Yes, yes, that’s the one!” Iroh nods enthusiastically. “Now…turn your head to the side, facing the judges.” Zuko can feel her ponytail brush his chest as she turns her head. “Then I want to see that smolder.” She tries, though she’s clearly trying just as hard not to laugh while smoldering into thin air. “Then I want your free hand around the back of his neck. You know, like at any moment you’re going to turn and kiss him.”

_That is not what she would be doing if she were going to kiss me,_ Zuko thinks, but there is no need to share that information with his uncle. Nevertheless, she tries the position, and he has to bite his lip so he won’t blush. She may be his girlfriend, but this exaggerated sensuality is entirely different and far more embarrassing to portray in a program than the gentle affection they’re used to.

“Good, good,” Iroh says approvingly. “Okay. Now, after the music starts, you’re going to unhook your leg and use that momentum to lunge backwards. Zuko, I trust you know what I’m talking about?”

  
He does. Iroh’s made him watch far too many videos of short dances (well, now they’re called _Rhythm Dances,_ for some reason, but they weren’t when those programs were performed so he chooses to ignore that) set to the Tango Romantica, this year’s required pattern for him not to know what his uncle is referring to.

  
“Then could you try it out?” he prompts.

He does, though it’s hardly a commendable effort – well, _Katara’s_ is, and she’s gotten the smolder that this program requires down in record time (he has to force himself _not_ to think about that), but he has no idea how he’s supposed to move in relation to his partner so as not to drop or collide with her. Iroh leaves it off with a few pointers and moves on, apparently not seeing the need to refine it much. “Okay, then Katara, you’re going to stand again-“

She’s as much of a natural as she was this time last year, though she’s repeatedly told him that she felt far more confident with the Finnstep than she does with the Tango Romantica. She can play the part seemingly without effort, but she’s never loved the intensity of the tango – “it feels weird, presenting myself that way,” she’d said, and he hadn’t had to ask what she meant. But she throws her hat in the ring anyway, and though he can see the doubt creeping in behind her painted-on expression, she gives it what she can.

  
That, he thinks, is Katara in a nutshell: she’ll give it her all whether she wants to or not, whether she believes in herself, or the program or the pattern or her partner, because if that is what it takes to get where she wants to be, there’s no price too steep to be paid. Others might call it inspiring; Zuko thinks of it as a wakeup call. There is, after all, a reason she’s chosen to skate with him, and if that’s the kind of commitment she expects of herself, all he can do is try to match it. He doesn’t think there’s another ice dancer in the world who could’ve given him that drive, nor made the way he shudders when her hand brushes his jaw in a quiet moment so convincing. No one else could’ve made the tedium of choreography so much less of a chore (he can admit, now, that he loves to skate, but getting new programs is and will always be tiresome).

They lock eyes, and suddenly the million leg-flicks every tango program seems to involve don’t seem half as extraneous as they did before.

**

**Downtown Caldera – Katara & Sokka’s apartment**

**June**

“So…this is where I live, I guess.” Katara sweeps her hand around the room in a wide arc, pointedly not looking back at Zuko so she won’t have to see what he thinks. “I…I know it’s not much, but, um, it was cheap, so here we are?”

“The Cheez Puffles are a nice touch,” Zuko comments lightly, glancing at an unmissable, powder-coated plastic container of the neon orange snack on the counter.

Katara groans. “That would be Sokka’s doing, and I keep telling him to put them away, but-“

“You _said_ not to put things back in the cupboard empty!” Sokka protests from his bedroom down the hallway. “You’re _welcome!”_

“You couldn’t just throw it away like a normal person? You knew I had company coming over!”

  
“It’s _Zuko._ He’s gonna want to make out with you whether there’s an empty thing of Cheez Puffles on the counter or not!”

“I mean, he’s not wrong,” Zuko adds helpfully.

“Thank you, but it’s the principle of the thing,” Katara says under her breath. She walks to the counter – it’s barely five steps in an apartment of this size, the only one two broke student-athletes could afford even with their father’s help – and grabs the offending container, giving it a disapproving shake before she tosses it in the trash can, shaking her head and muttering something about the Cheez Puffles dust she’s going to be unable to wash off her hands for a week. “Now. Um…what…what do you want to do?”

She’s never exactly had a boyfriend over, and _he’s_ never exactly _been_ a boyfriend coming over, so they pause at an awkward impasse, both scrambling for answers they can’t seem to dredge up. “Um…watch TV?” Zuko shrugs. “That’s, like…normal, right?”

“You’re the one who’s had a girlfriend before. You tell me.”

“Mai only ever wanted to go to concerts. That’s different.” Zuko gnaws his lip, taking this all very seriously. “Inapplicable.”

“Well, we _could_ watch TV, but we don’t exactly have cable-“

“That’s fine. Not like anyone uses cable anymore.”

“Or Netflix.”

“…Hulu?”

“Nope.”

“HBO?”

“Again, no.”

“Well, that sort of defeats the purpose of watching TV, then.”

“Unless you want to watch the local news,” Katara says, a little sheepish.

“No, no, it’s fine! Um…we could cook?”

“Do I really trust you not to start a fire?”

“Yeah, good point.”

“You could read my textbooks to me,” Katara suggests drily. “Get that human anatomy practice in before school starts.”

“I am _not_ helping you _study_ in the _summer.”_

  
“I figured you’d say that.” She taps her foot, as if the gesture will jog her memory. “Maybe-“

  
“Wait, do you still have my copy of _The Orchid Society_?”

“Well, yeah,” Katara says, raising her eyebrows, “but I, um…I haven’t exactly finished it.”

  
“You could…read it to me?”

“You’re the one who’s already read it!”

“ _Your_ dream might be to make the Olympic team, but _mine_ has always been to have my hot girlfriend read political fantasy novels to me while I lay in her lap, you know.”

“You’re…you’re kidding, right?”

“Only slightly.”

“Well, who am I to kill your dream,” Katara mutters, and disappears into the hallway. “Be back in a minute. I have to get the book from my room.”

  
“Oh? Do you sleep with it under your pillow?”

“Oh, no, you’ve unmasked my secret shame!” she calls down the hallway, then cackles. “It’s the only thing that gets me through the long, cold nights without your warmth!”

“Oh, really?” he teases. Teasing is usually Katara’s forte, not Zuko’s, but he thinks he’s picked up a few things. “You could have told me that.”

Katara returns with the book, with which she promptly whacks his arm. “I have to warn you that our couch smells like Cheez Puffles and Fire Flake Crisps,” she says before flopping down on the couch back-first and adjusting the pillows behind her so they prop up her back. “Enter if you dare.”

“Mm, I think the benefits outweigh the costs,” Zuko replies, and flops down atop Katara as she had the couch. She lets out a half-indignant shriek of laughter at the sudden impact, and he shifts to use her shoulder as a pillow. “This warm enough for you?”

“Plenty,” Katara assures him, pausing to brush her fingers through Zuko’s hair before she picks up the book. “So, do you want me to start at the beginning?”

“Where’d you leave off?” he asks, wrapping his outside arm around her waist.

“…the beginning.”

“I gave this book to you almost a year ago!”

“And I haven’t even started it. I know. Awful girlfriend.”

“Best girlfriend,” he mumbles, nuzzling his cheek against her shoulder like a happy cat. “Worst reading habits.”

That earns him another smack on the arm with his own book.

“Okay.” Katara clears her throat. “You all settled in?”

“Mmm.”

“I’ll take that as a yes.” She flips past the introduction until she finds the first chapter. “Chapter One: Inauspicious Tidings,” she begins. “No one whose birth had chanced them with residence in the land of Caldera had known, in their lifetime, anything but war…”

It’s a little bit hard to follow the story as she reads aloud, but Katara barely minds; Zuko doesn’t really seem to be paying any more attention than she is, and a little flutter kicks up in her chest at the realization that it is her voice that he finds so soothing, not a favorite story. Every so often she stumbles over a sentence, too distracted by the rhythmic rise and fall of Zuko’s shoulders to keep her eyes on the page; every so often, she stops to ask if he’s comfortable (she always gets the same contented “mmm” in reply) just to see if he’s awake. It seems only a matter of time before he isn’t, so when she asks for the sixth time – they’ve only made it to chapter four – and he doesn’t respond, she smiles knowingly.

“It’s okay,” she murmurs, though she knows she’ll get no reply. “You can sleep. I won’t move ya.” The urge to stroke his hair, off-season shaggy now that they won’t be competing for a few months, is almost irresistible, and she smiles at the way he nudges into her touch even in his sleep. “You’re so sweet,” she says absentmindedly, freeing her hands to wrap them around his waist. “Do I ever tell you that?”

Sokka pokes his head in the door, grimaces at the sight of his sister murmuring sweet nothings to her sleeping boyfriend, and ducks out before he’s subjected to any more of this.

“You just sleep as long as you need to, sweet boy,” she finishes, bending to kiss the crown of his head. “I’ll still be here when you wake up.”

She doesn’t know why she says it, but somehow it seems important to.

**

**July**

**Ann Arbor, Michigan**

**Rhythm Dance**

This should be easy.

Katara has never been one to shy away from a challenge. Putting on a show is what she does best. She doesn’t have to pretend that she feels the tension that a tango requires.

This is _not_ easy.

She feels out-of-place as she takes the ice at Ann Arbor for another season opener, and it’s alarming when she’s always been so sure that she belonged out here. But it all feels _off:_ the clingy black velvet of her dress, the sultry _bandoneon_ of their music, this closeness in front of a crowd even when the audience is small. She’s skated to tango music before, but never at this level, nor with someone she loved. It’s going to take getting used to.

But when he looks at her – _really_ looks at her, with the kind of weighty expression that would be impossible to mistake for anything but love – before they take their starting positions, she wonders if that’s even possible. To distill the safety she feels in his hand at the small of her back, the devotion it took to earn her trust, to smoldering glances and a lift that could double as an act of public indecency seems to cheapen it.

  
All for the sport, she supposes.

The Tango Romantica is tricky in a different way than the Finnstep was: it’s languid but sharp, where last year’s pattern was all bounce and exuberance. Moreso than almost any other dance, this tango is a performance moreso than it is a pattern; any team can execute the steps, but few can inhabit them. For now, all they need to do is hit their key points, but it won’t be able to be this raw forever, and the mounting pressure of this program’s future makes it hard to begin at all. That Zuko has to remind her to breathe as they prepare to begin is not surprising.

But, unsure as she is, Katara is nothing if not diligent, and she’s as prepared as two months could have her. It’s never been the steps of the tango that she struggled with – though they’re not as fun as those of the Finnstep, she can’t deny that their sharpness and snap and flair are satisfying, though her calves always burn when she’s through with them. They open with the pattern, which is in some ways good (it gives her a chance to get settled in) and in some ways not (it’s hard to be at the peak of one’s performance in the first minute of a program). But that hardly matters today when no one is at their best and most of their competitors are mid-level American teams who’ll probably never compete internationally anyways.

(Maybe, if she tells herself that enough times, she won’t feel as if she’s facing the prying eyes of thousands when, in reality, it’s ten audience members, a panel of judges, a livestream, and Zuko.)

This should be the easiest dance to get lost in, and maybe, under different circumstances, she would. But she finds herself wishing the audience she so wants to draw in would look away.

******

**July**

**Ann Arbor, Michigan**

**The Night of the Rhythm Dance**

Hotel lobbies are the place to be on between-event nights, and this one is no exception with the turnout at the Ann Arbor Invitational this year. It’s a low-stakes enough competition to permit mingling between skaters who, at an event whose outcome mattered more than this one’s does, would probably not have conversed beyond a perfunctory greeting for politeness’ sake. There’s not much to do around here anyways, so nearly every senior competitor – and the younger skaters who are always following skaters of a certain rank at events, to Katara’s delight and Zuko’s slight perplexity and occasional annoyance – has descended on the hotel lobby. It’s big enough to allow a decently-sized group to gather around the unlit fireplace, but small enough to be intimate; despite Zuko’s obvious aversion to the idea of speaking to people other than his girlfriend, she insists that they join.

Their presence, to his dismay, is not ignored.

“Roomie!” Korra Ayuluk calls from the large couch in the middle of the half-moon-shaped cluster of chairs, waving them over. “C’mon! We’ve got room over here.”

“Hey, Korra! Been a while, huh?” Katara replies, seemingly happier than she’s been all week, and she leaves Zuko with little choice but to join her on the couch. It’s already almost full: Eska and Desna sit at one end, whispering to each other (he doesn’t want to ask), and Korra sits a few feet down beside Asami Sato, pointedly avoiding eye contact. Katara takes a seat at the other end and leans her head against Zuko’s shoulder.

“Seriously, not since Worlds! Feels like forever,” Korra replies. “It must’ve been. Haven’t seen that kiss gif in a while.”

Zuko wishes the couch cushions were made of quicksand.

  
“Oh, that!” Katara laughs. “Yeah, we started calling that ‘Gifgate’ at the Cricket Club. Just goes to show that you never know what the internet is going to go for, you know?”  
  


“Oh, are you talking about the kissing gif?” Haru, another ice dancer and perhaps their only viable competition at this event, calls from a few armchairs over. “Dude. I don’t know why everyone made such a big thing out of that.”

“Oh, yeah, that was so weird,” Haru’s partner, Song, cuts in. “Seriously, it’s not like anyone _didn’t_ already know that you guys were dating.”

“Were we _that_ obvious?” Zuko mutters under his breath.

“Yes,” nearly every skater in their half-circle choruses.

He curses under his breath. No one was meant to hear that.

“Well, it’s not like we’re trying to hide it,” Katara laughs, reaching up to ruffle Zuko’s hair. “Nor were we ever.”

“Um, _I_ was!”

“Oh, really?”

“Yes, _really!”_

“Well, the way I remember it, it was _you_ who asked to kiss _me_ at Worlds.”

Even the twins look mildly amused at that.

“Well, yeah, but that was _after,”_ Zuko protests uselessly.

“Right,” Katara says primly, wrapping an arm around his waist. “Well, now they know.”

“I would say so,” Asami pipes up. It’s the first either has heard from her since they arrived and it gets both of their attention.

“It is not as if you and your underling are not in equally close proximity,” Eska points out. Asami rolls her eyes, but it’s clear that she’s rattled.

“What are you talking about?” Korra asks, faking innocence with absolutely no conviction. “We’re not…we’re not doing anything.”

  
“Exactly,” Eska deadpans. “You probably should be.”

“I’m going to pretend that I didn’t hear that,” Asami scoffs. Korra glances over at her, a little worried, but looks away just as suddenly.

“Denial,” Eska replies. “My favorite.”

Given what little he knows about her, Zuko doesn’t think Eska is capable of having a favorite _anything,_ but he’s far too afraid of her to point that out.  
  


“You know what bugs me?” Song cuts in, sensing the group’s need for a change of subject before Eska sees fit to make any further attempts at matchmaking.

“What?” Katara asks, seizing on the change of subject.

“That fireplace,” Song says. “I mean…is it even real? I know it’s not lit, but what if that’s because it _doesn’t light?”_

“I hope it’s real,” Desna says. “Real ones are fire hazards.”

“You… _want_ this building to burn down?” Korra crosses her arms. “Even for you, that seems excessive.”

“It would be so tragically ironic,” Eska cuts in. “Because, like. Ice. Fire. It’s poetic.”

“Only you,” Korra mutters, then brightens. “But we should totally ask, right, Song?”

“What are we, twelve? We’re not asking them if the fireplace is real,” Zuko scoffs. He earns an elbow to the ribs for that.

  
“If you won’t do it, I will.” Haru shrugs, then pats Song’s shoulder. “Coming with?”

“Well, duh!” Song says brightly.

“Wha’s this actually s’posed to accomplish?” Katara yawns, sinking even more heavily into Zuko’s side. “D’we want them to light it?”

“I have no idea,” Zuko admits once Song and Haru, giggling like teenagers sneaking out of their prom, have headed out for the front desk. “It’s not like it’s cold.”

  
“Really? ‘m freezing,” Katara says. “The air conditioning here is…a lot.”

“Well, that’s true. Guess I’ve always just run warm.” Zuko drapes his arm around her middle. “Do you want my jacket?”

“Mmhm.” Katara tilts her chin up to look at him. “’m freezing.”

“You should’ve said so,” he fusses, unzipping his Team Canada jacket (it’s the only one he brought with him – he’s never been a heavy packer) and draping it across her shoulders, held in place beneath his arm. “Better?”

“Yeah,” she says, and though she seems like she can barely keep her eyes open, she smiles up at him. “Thanks.”

  
“You sleepy?”

“Little bit,” she admits. “I didn’t sleep much last night.”

“What, did Eska keep you up trying to summon eldritch horrors or something?” he asks, rubbing circles on the back of his jacket. Katara hadn’t been particularly happy to have been assigned to room with her.

“No, the rhythm dance.”

“Our rhythm dance was summoning eldritch horrors in your hotel room last night? Hm. Sounds suspicious.”

  
“Shuddup,” Katara mutters. “You know how it makes me anxious.”

“I knew you didn’t like it, but I didn’t know it was that bad.” His forehead creases with worry. “Have you talked to anyone about-“

“Nothing I can do,” she says curtly, shifting uncomfortably against his shoulder.

“We’ll talk about this later,” he replies. “When you’re not as tired.”

“Don’t needa,” she mumbles into his shoulder, and then goes quiet. He doesn’t say another word, stroking her hair as her breathing evens and slows. Distantly, Zuko is aware that there are people around, but he’s forgotten to care.

  
“’Tara?” he asks softly after what must be ten minutes of silence. When he doesn’t get a reply, he shakes his head fondly and slings her arm around his shoulder.

He knows the skaters still gathered in the lobby – and the nonplussed receptionist who’s come to light the fireplace, despite the oppressive heat outside – are probably whispering, but he’s not particularly concerned. She needs rest, and she’s going to get it somewhere more suitable than an uncomfortable couch in a bustling hotel lobby. Besides, he’s had enough practice that carrying Katara is nothing anymore, and she feels feather-light curled up against his chest, covered in his jacket, as he walks, careful not to jostle her. That’s one of the things he’d been most amused to learn about his partner: once she falls asleep, she is _out._ It would take a lot more than this to stir her.

“It’s all right,” he murmurs, pressing a kiss to her hairline. “I’m just getting you somewhere quieter, ‘kay?” He doesn’t expect a response, but he wants her to know anyways. “I got you.”

She blinks up at Zuko sleepily and he curses himself for waking her. “Go back to sleep,” he tells her. “I’m just-“

She reaches for the pocket of her jeans. “My key card,” she says groggily. “You need it.”

“Oh.” He hadn’t thought of that. “Of course.”

“Are you…did you carry me from the lobby?” she asks, still sleepy. “How long was I out?”

“Not long. Sorry I woke you.”

“No, I’m glad.” She wraps her arms around his neck, burying her face in the fabric of his shirt. “Thank you.”

“It’s no problem,” he demurs. “I just feel bad for waking you up.”

She lets out a sleepy whine that could mean anything, starting to drift off again. He breathes a sigh of relief. “There you go,” he murmurs, pressing the “up” button on the elevator.

  
It’s one of the fancy ones with mirrors for walls. He catches a glimpse of the pair of them – he, dissheveled in joggers and a worn theater shirt from high school, and she, curled up in his arms beneath a jacket that dwarfs her small frame – in one of them, and smiles.

He’s so _lucky._

He almost wishes she were awake to ask him to stay when he sets her down on the bed, but she isn’t, and he’s not about to disturb her, so he leaves her with a kiss to the forehead and his jacket draped over her like a blanket. “Love you,” he says pointlessly, though the words are never pointless, before he turns to go.

He’d never admit to the glance he steals over his shoulder as he leaves.

******

**July**

**Ann Arbor, Michigan**

**The Morning of the Free Dance**

“Your butler must’ve carried you back to the room last night,” Eska announces, flinging open the blinds without an ounce of regard for her roommate’s sleep. “That, or you can teleport.”

  
Katara doesn’t even look up. “He’s my _boyfriend,_ Eska.”

“There’s a difference?”

**

**July**

**Ann Arbor, Michigan**

**Post-Free Dance**

Katara has never felt more caged-in.

“I…it really isn’t that big of a deal,” she protests weakly, face down so she won’t have to meet her partner’s and coach’s worried eyes. “I’m just not comfortable with the program yet. It’ll come with time.”

Zuko crosses from the bed where he’s been sitting to the couch on the opposite wall. It’s situated behind a table that Katara has been using to keep her distance, which he largely ignores. She doesn’t stop him from sitting down beside her, or from taking her hand, but it’s clear that she isn’t thrilled.

“You said that you didn’t get any sleep because of this,” he reminds her. “And you…really don’t ever get nervous like that.”

“Yeah, but that’s just…a silly hang-up.” Denial won’t work, so she tries deflection. “It’s not like I can’t just get over it.”

“What is?” Iroh cuts in. “What is it about that program that makes you so nervous?”

“It’s…I don’t know.” Katara hunches her shoulders, folding in on herself. “I guess I’m just being weird.”

“Katara.” Zuko squeezes her hand a little too emphatically. “You told me that you weren’t comfortable with it. There’s a reason for that.”

“Well, yeah, but-“

“We want to help you, Katara,” Iroh says gently. “And we can’t do that without _you.”_

“I just…” she lets out a heavy sigh. “It’s…I never had this problem in the past. I’ve skated tangos before, and…nothing like this.”

“What changed?” Zuko asks.

“Well…” Katara pauses to consider. “Well, I guess that it being all, like…sensual and stuff was kind of weird for me when I was younger? But…I don’t think that’s why now.” She chews her lip, casts her eyes down, wrings her hands. “I mean, it kind of is, but…”

“But?”

“I don’t want to say it.”

“Is it going to help you figure this out?”

“I mean, maybe, but I don’t _want_ to.” Katara’s voice begins to waver. “I just…I _can’t.”_

“It’s okay, ‘Tara.” Zuko reaches for her hand again and traces the lines of her palm the way he knows she likes him to. “You don’t have to.”

“Okay.” She takes a breath. “Okay.”

“Is it the choreography?” Iroh asks. “We can change it.”

“No, it isn’t that,” Katara replies. “It’s more just the…vibe? If that makes sense?”

“I’m not sure what you mean.”

“The whole bedroom-eyes act,” she admits. “I thought I’d be okay because, like…flirty programs have always been easy for me, but this isn’t the same.” Katara pauses, swallows, then begins again. “It’s…really intense.”

“That’s how the dance is,” Iroh agrees.

“And I think it’s worse now because the, um…the feelings I’m supposed to be portraying are actually real.” She can’t look at either of them. “They never were before.”

  
Zuko, wordlessly, wraps an arm around her shoulders, which she gratefully accepts.

“I guess I’m more private than I realized,” she says, almost ashamed. “I just hate…I don’t know, taking feelings that personal and turning them into a performance.” _What I feel for you isn’t for the rest of the world to watch,_ she wants to add, but won’t in front of his uncle. “It…just freaks me out.”  
  
A heavy silence falls over the group for a moment before Zuko breaks it.

  
“Would this be easier for you if we weren’t together?”

Katara’s eyes widen in shock. “What? No!”

  
“But-“

“I could break up with you right now and still have feelings for you by the end of the season, Zuko. _That’s_ what bugs me, and it’s not going away.”

Though he’d been willing, his shoulders slump in relief. “Okay.”

“I’m not really sure what to do,” she admits, voice small. “I can’t get around this.”

“But we’ll find a way through it,” Iroh reassures her. “My nephew probably has more useful things to say about than I would, but I can assure you of that.”

She nods. “I hope so.”


	11. Lucky

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's my party and I can have my characters skate to Hamilton because I'm a 2010s theater kid if I want to. (See Chapter 10 notes for music cut link.) 
> 
> *clears throat* anyways! Today was supposed to be my day to update "Fraternizing with the Enemy," but a recent outpouring of support for this story on Twitter (follow me @hinaoyamas!) has gotten me super excited about it, so I wanted to update it instead. I've now got a loose outline and part of an epilogue...we may have 21 chapters to go, but I feel like I'm in the home stretch! So please enjoy the Skate Canada chapter. :)

**_October 2019_ **

**_Skate Canada International_ **

**_Vancouver, Canada_ **

****

There’s nothing like a hometown crowd, and that isn’t always a good thing.

After last year’s World Championships, there had been little doubt of Zuko and Katara’s being assigned to two Grand Prix events again – a near top-ten placement would do that. But neither had expected to be given the hometown-team nod at Skate Canada – and not even as host picks this time! – and it’s a little jarring.

“Guess we’ve officially made it,” Katara comments lightly as the shuttle from their hotel pulls up to the arena for the first day of practices.

  
“I doubt that.” Zuko eyes the huge banners advertising the event on every available surface and winces when his eyes land on one emblazoned with a wall-sized picture of the two of them. He recognizes the photo they used – it’s from Worlds, though thankfully not of the Gifgate kiss. In it, he is looking at Katara, who looks close to tears, as if he wants to catch fire; it’s not a look he particularly enjoys seeing plastered on the side of a building. “Did they have to pick _that_ one?”

His hand slips into hers without a thought as they walk – it’s a habit Zuko doesn’t quite realize he’s created, and Katara isn’t about to inform him when she knows it would make him stop. “Well, it’s nice to be appreciated?” she offers.

“I’d rather not be _appreciated_ by every schmuck in Vancouver who has to drive past this building on their way to work,” he sighs.

Katara shakes her head fondly, pauses, and rises on her toes to kiss his cheek. “If it’s any consolation, I appreciate you, too.”

“You’re very cute at very inconvenient times, you know that?”

“Zuko, please. I’m cute _all_ the time.”

“You’re pushing it, is what you are,” he teases, falling into the familiar rhythm of their banter. It’s taken him a while to get used to, but now it’s as easy as awkward silence. “Flirting before practice? You’re just asking for trouble, young lady.”

“Oh, Spirits, you sound like a grandma,” Katara laughs, though it comes out as more of a snort than the flirtatious giggle she probably intends. “I love you, but you are not and will never be slick.”

“I am _very_ slick!” Zuko raises his eyebrows in mock indignation. “I’m absolutely _devastated_ that you’d imply otherwise after all of my hard work!”

“Hey, hey, I’m teasing,” she replies, briefly leaning her head against shoulder as a show of good faith. “Sorry. Was that too much?” She’s learned to read his signals as much as he has hers, and she knows that he sometimes can’t read people the way she assumes he can – it’s always best to be sure.

“No, I’m just bad at being sarcastic,” he admits, his cheeks coloring. “I…I knew you were joking. You’re okay.”

“All right.” She bites her lip so she won’t snort again. “You’re just so easy to rile up. I can never be sure.”

“That, I _do_ take offense to,” he mutters, but he’s still smiling.

(He isn’t surprised when, upon arrival in the arena’s lobby, a blank-faced, coffee-holding Oma Li tells them, in no fewer words, to get a room.)

**

**_October 2019_ **

**_Skate Canada International_ **

**_Vancouver, Canada_ **

**_Rhythm Dance_ **

Katara really thought she’d learned how to hide these things. But something in the way her breath hitches when she gets nervous tips her partner off almost immediately, and clearly, she should’ve known better.

“You can talk to me, Kay.” He reaches over to rub circles into the back of her hand. “Are you feeling anxious again?”

The last thing Katara wants to do is hash out her unresolved tango anxiety ten minutes before she has to go on and skate it in front of thousands of people, so she diverts the subject. “Why do you call me that? It’s not pronounced _Kay-tara,”_ she says, a little peevish. If it gets his attention off of the issue at hand, it’ll do.

“It’s the first letter of your name,” he says patiently, though he seems a little surprised at her protest. “Do you not like it?”

She risks a glance over at him, too short to let him see the fear in her eyes, and shakes her head rapidly. “No, I do.”

“Okay.” He leans across the already minimal distance between them to kiss her forehead. “I just wanted to check on you.”

“I’ll make it work.” The roiling dread in her stomach only grows more tumultuous with the lie. “I always do.”

“Hey, no.” Zuko angles his body towards hers, then takes her fidgeting hands. “If you’re nervous, I…I want to know.”

“Of course I’m _nervous_. I have to undress you with my eyes in front of thousands of people and I’m either going to have to…share you with a crowd or fake it and look like a fool.” Her voice grows shuddery, and Zuko drops her hands so he can cradle her face. “I’m _terrified,_ Zee. But what choice do I have?”

“Aww, you did the letter thing, too-“

“ _Not_ the point!”

Zuko clears his throat. “Right. Sorry. Anyways.” He strokes the line of her jaw with his thumb with a little hum of satisfaction when the slight tremor in her tense muscles subsides. “I know how hard this is for you, and I wish I could figure out what you needed to hear, but…I can’t. So can I ask you to look at me?”

Her eyes open, wary but trusting. “Okay.”

“There you go.” Zuko pushes the tendril of hair intentionally left out of her low side bun behind her ear so it won’t fall in her eyes the way he knows she hates it to. “Just look at me, and breathe, okay?”

  
She nods weakly and takes a shaky breath.

“Good,” he murmurs. “At the end of the day, it’s just us out there, right? Just you and me, Zuko. _Your_ Zuko,who loves you.” The tiny smile she allows to slip past her defenses at that does things to his heart that shouldn’t even be legal. “You can always be honest with me, you know that?”

“Are you _trying_ to make me cry?”

“What? No!”

“Then do you have to be so unbelievably _sweet_ right before we go on?”

“I…I was just trying to help.”

“Zee,” she says, a soft laugh splitting the syllable’s end in two. “You _did.”_

“Oh?”

“Of course you did.”

“So…you’re feeling a little better?”

  
“A little.”

“Huh.” _What do you know,_ he can’t help but think. _Maybe I_ can _use words when it counts._ It’s the kind of warm, satisfied feeling that lingers on his shoulders long after the moment has passed, and he notes with pride that Katara’s eyes don’t leave his for more than the seconds it takes to turn as they warm up. They’re first up in the second group, so there’s not much lag time – all the better for maintaining the momentum they built up during the warmup – and they wait by the boards before they’re officially called.

Katara presses her forehead to his for a beat just long enough to let him register the contact. “Just us, right?” she says with more reluctance than conviction.

He takes her hands just before they’re called to begin. “Just us.”

This music – _Invierno Porteno_ for the tango pattern, _Poeta_ in the quicker middle section – is hardly the most sensuous they could’ve chosen, though the pattern is inherently heated. It’s rather chilly, as far as tangos go, allowing for more elegance than seduction – it’s certainly not _María de Buenos Aires,_ which had been Iroh’s first choice and immediately scrapped by a flustered Katara. So it’s not, in a lot of ways, as bad as it could be; this opening section allows for the showing-off of the clean, elegant lines they rarely get to put on display this way.

It’s still full of the heated looks Katara is so worried for, though, and Zuko is certain that there’s more concern than desire (however faked, though it rarely is) in his eyes when they meet hers. She’s wide-eyed and a little paler than usual, but seems to be holding up a little better than she was in Ann Arbor two months ago. Just to be safe, though, he gives her hip a little squeeze through the velvet of her dress, and he doesn’t miss the fractional smile that flits across her face.

It almost makes him feel a little guilty for the way he’s come to love this dance. Stiffness is rarely a concern of his anymore, which is a miracle in and of itself, and with it out of the way, he’s come to appreciate the sharp but deliberate curves of the Tango Romantica. It’s not fussy and detail-heavy like the Finnstep was, nor as irritatingly bouncy and upbeat; it feels like pure _dance,_ something he’s only now realizing that he appreciates. But he’d never verbalize those feelings, not when Katara is so torn-up over the same program. He enjoys the tango quietly and gives what support he can, and that will have to be enough.

He hopes the hometown crowd (Caldera is only two hours out of Vancouver) agrees.

“Not so bad, right?” Katara asks when the music has died down and he pulls her into his arms.

“Not so bad,” he repeats. “I think” – he pauses to let the audience’s surprisingly-raucous applause die down – “that they think so, too.”

Katara laughs nervously. “Seems like it.”

She’s still a little tense when they reach the Kiss-and-Cry, even with Zuko’s arm around her (they’re so rarely _not_ touching these days that it’s a given), but it’s a start.

**

**_October 2019_ **

**_Skate Canada International_ **

**_Vancouver, Canada_ **

**_In Between Programs_ **

“What do you want at this hour?”

Katara blinks a couple times, taking in the entirely unexpected sight of Azula Nishimura in sweats and a ratty Junior Grand Prix Belgrade t-shirt that has to be at least five years old. Her hair is falling out of its unkempt ponytail, and her eyes are heavy with exhaustion. “Oh, um, sorry,” she demurs. “I thought…it’s only seven-thirty-“

“And I’m exhausted, so I’m _very_ sorry to be barged in on right now.”

“It’s about Zuko,” Katara says, and she has to suppress a smirk at Azula’s raised eyebrows. _Checkmate._ Azula won’t admit it, but no one matters to her more than her brother does (unless that someone is whatever medal she’s chasing at the moment, and Katara doesn’t count those) – if anything was going to get her attention, it would be that.

“Has he gone and gotten himself hit by a bus again?”

“ _Again?”_

“Don’t ask.”

“Um, Azula…?”

“What? Like it’s unusual?” Azula looks even more done with this conversation than she did when Katara arrived. “Is there something wrong with him? Actually, scratch that. There are a _lot_ of things wrong with him. Is there something _new_ wrong with him?”

_Well, this is new._ Katara’s never known Azula to be so flustered. “Um, no, it’s about his birthday,” she says, almost at a loss for words.

“…this really couldn’t wait?”

  
“Azula, it’s _seven.”_

“Jet lag is a thing.”

“You once told me that you were, and I quote, ‘immune to jet lag,’” Katara points out.

“Competing is stressful.”

“Look, you don’t have to help me, but I know it would mean a lot to your brother,” she tries again. “His birthday is the day of the free dance, you know that. Obviously we can’t do anything the day of, but I want to try to do something that night, and…I don’t know what he’d want to do,” she admits, a little embarrassed that she doesn’t already know this. “I figured you’d know if anyone would.”

“No parties. He hates those.” Azula opens her door a crack wider to let Katara in. “I don’t know how you’d throw one, but don’t try. If you ask him, he likes sushi and procedural shows, but he actually likes-“

“Fire flake Doritos, and Golden Age musicals, and period dramas based on books,” she finishes. “Got that.”

“And his girlfriend,” Azula adds drily.

“And me, I suppose.” Katara has to bite her lip because she knows Azula will never let her hear the end of it if she grins like an idiot at that. “So you think he’ll want to stay in?”

“My best bet? Give him your key card, tell him to go put on sweats and join you, and feed him chips while _Pride and Prejudice_ plays in the background.” Azula rolls her eyes. “Don’t ask me why.”

“You sure he wouldn’t want to spend it with…the rest of his friends?” Katara asks warily. “I mean, he’s only really been spending time with me lately.”

  
The briefest flash of hurt crosses Azula’s face before it dissipates. “Please. You’re the only person in the world he remembers to acknowledge anymore.”

Azula is rather lucky that Katara is better at reading people than almost anyone she’s ever met. “I’m sure that’s not true,” she says soothingly, though the look in her eyes is anything but.

“Please. Even when he’s with someone else, it’s Katara this and Katara that.”

Katara is charitable enough not to point out that she sounds like Azula has a more personal stake in this than she wants to admit. “Well, all the more reason to…flesh out the guest list.”

“You can’t be implying that you’re going to throw a party for my antisocial brother in a hotel room.”

“No,” Katara says innocently. “He doesn’t like enough people for that.”

“Hm.” Azula begins to retreat behind her door again. “Well, good luck with that.”

“Azula, if you’re not in my room at eight tomorrow night, I’m going to break into yours and drag you there myself.”

“Then I’m bringing vodka.”

“Azula, you’re _underage._ How are you going to get vodka?”

“In most of the world, I’m not,” she counters. “Isn’t it like one of those price-matching deals? If another country lets you drink younger, then the one you’re in has to judge you by that law instead of theirs?”

“You don’t actually believe that.”

“It was worth a shot.” She smirks. “And I have a fake ID.”

Azula closes the door in Katara’s face before she has a chance to protest.

**

**_October 2019_ **

**_Skate Canada International_ **

**_Vancouver, Canada_ **

**_In Between Programs_ **

“Toph?” Zuko narrows his eyes. “What are you doing up?”

“Oh, hey.” Toph turns in the direction of Zuko’s voice brandishing a bag of gummy bears that he’s absolutely sure Yangchen didn’t approve. “What brings you to the vending machine?”

“Toph, it’s _eleven.”_

“Yeah, and?”

“I’m getting a water, if you must know.”

“And I’m getting gummy bears,” she says, holding up her bag. “ _If you must know.”_

“Yeah, but water is a way more reasonable thing to be getting at eleven o’clock than gummy bears.”

“I disagree, but have it your way,” she sighs. “So…I hear it’s your birthday tomorrow.”

“You hate small talk. Why are you making small talk?”

“It’s not small talk.”

“And how did you know that?”

“Reasons,” Toph says coolly. “How old are you going to be?”

“Um…twenty-three?”

“A regular hag,” Toph cackles.

“You know, I really don’t need to be standing here taking that kind of slander from a girl who’s barely old enough to drive a car.” Zuko shoves his hands in his pockets.

“No, but thanks. I need the distraction,” she admits, though she’s so nonchalant about it that it hardly sounds like an admission of anything.

  
“Oh?” Zuko studies her face and he’s surprised that he missed the shadows under her eyes. “From what?”

“Nothing,” she sighs heavily.

“Well, now I _have_ to know.”

“Would you believe me if I told you it was the free skate?”

“No, I really wouldn’t.”

“I figured.” Toph shoves her hands in the kangaroo pocket of her hoodie – he finds the mirroring of his posture amusing given that she can’t see him. “It’s stupid.”

“I doubt you would be out in the hallway buying gummy bears at midnight-“

“ _Eleven.”_

“-if it were really stupid.” He touches her arm, and she follows that cue and his footsteps into the hallway. He takes a seat against the wall and keeps his hand on her arm to steady her as she sits beside him. “What’s actually going on?”

Toph folds in on herself, already-tiny frame scrunching up even smaller as she hugs her knees to her chest. “Can you promise me you won’t say anything to anyone about this?”

“Of course, Toph. Scout’s honor.”

“Since when were you a Boy Scout?”

“I am _shocked_ that you understood that reference.”

“Well, I did, and I think it’s stupid because you don’t actually _have_ that, but go on.”

“You can trust me,” he says instead. “I mean, who do I talk to?”

“The two most talkative people at our rink, and the meanest?”

“Wait, who’s the other talkative person?”

“Your uncle?” Toph shakes her head. “He loves gossip _way_ too much for an old dude.”

“Fair enough.” Zuko shrugs. “But I won’t tell anyone. What’s up?”

“My partner,” Toph admits, her face tucked into her knees.

“Aang?” Zuko raises his eyebrow, then inches closer to put his arm around the younger girl’s shoulders. Perhaps it’s Katara’s influence, but he’s been finding affection easier lately. “I thought you two got along.”

“We do,” Toph says. “Always have. That’s just the problem.”

“How is that a problem?”

“Because we’re _friends.”_

“I’m…really not following.”

“Because he thinks of me as a friend.”

“Isn’t that what you want?”

“No, it _isn’t!”_

_Oh._

_Wow. They were not lying about you being dense._

“You…like him?”

“You don’t have to say it like _that!”_

“What do you mean, ‘like that’? What do you want me to say instead?”

  
“Silent acknowledgement would be better,” she grumbles. “Considering that I didn’t even want to admit it to myself for a good six months.”

He squeezes her shoulder. “That’s a long time.”

“No kidding,” she says glumly. “But what else was I going to do? He likes that On Ji girl.”

“He does?”

“It’s obvious.” Toph Beifong has never seemed anything short of invincible to Zuko, and it’s strange to see her this way – vulnerable, unconfident, _sixteen._ He forgets how young she is sometimes but it’s impossible not to notice now that she’s opening up like this.

“And what are you going to do about it?”

“Bold of you to assume I’m going to do anything.” Toph shakes her head, the two pigtails she often wears off the ice bouncing against her sweatshirt. “He’s my _partner,_ Zuko. Why risk it?”

“Because you like him, and you don’t actually know that he doesn’t feel the same way?” Zuko offers. “At very least, I know he cares about you.”

“Yeah, as a _friend.”_ She squeezes her eyes shut miserably. “It’s _awful._ You know how he’s all huggy? Well, _that_ sucks now. And every time he tells me I’m his best friend I want to jump into an active volcano.”

“Sounds like you’ve got it pretty bad.”

  
“Shut up.”

“Just making an observation.” He looks over at her, even though he knows she won’t notice. “I can tell you from experience that I thought the same thing about Katara, and that ended up working out fine.”

“You and Katara had only known each other for a few months,” Toph points out. “And she wasn’t your best friend.”

“Toph, I _had_ no other friends.”

“She wasn’t your best friend who you’d known since you were five and who’d been the one constant in your life for eleven years,” Toph amends.

“…well, no, I’ll give you that.”

“So no, I’m not going to say anything.” She pauses. “And since when have you ever been so… _mushy?_ It’s not like you.”

“Um…?”

“You going soft on me, Nishimura?”

“Oh, _there_ she is.” It’s almost a relief to see Toph return to her usual wisecracking sharpness. “Well…I guess love will do that to a person.”

“Eugh.” Toph shakes her head. “I liked you better when you were mean for no reason.”

“Well, you might be the only one.” He pats her shoulder. “You gonna be okay?”   
  


She smacks his leg with a bag of gummy bears as he stands. Her aim is surprisingly accurate.

“I’ll take that as a yes.”

**

**_October 2019_ **

**_Skate Canada International_ **

**_Vancouver, Canada_ **

**_Free Dance_ **

If Katara is a fish out of water in the rhythm dance, she’s entirely at home in the free dance. It had taken a little bit of begging, but she’d finally convinced her partner and coach of the merits of _Hamilton_ (Zuko had taken a _lot_ of wearing-down) last May, and the rest was history. She hardly has to act this time – their music, which is about an eclectic a mix of songs from the musical as can be put together, is fun and angsty and romantic at turns, and _all_ of it feels, somehow, exactly in her element. From the step sequence in hold to her favorite section of “Take a Break” to the simple, innocent blue empire-waist shift she’s wearing (so different than her slinky tango dress that it’s almost amusing), it’s _exactly_ what she’d envisioned when she’d advocated for this music.

Sometimes, with the anxiety she always ends up mired in when she thinks about the rhythm dance, she forgets how _natural_ skating can feel – how much fun it is. This is a constant reminder.

So, right before they’re called on to skate – first in the last group again after their sixth-place short dance – she pokes at the ruffle at Zuko’s collar just to watch his nose wrinkle in distaste.

“Do you _have_ to do that?”

“I do, sorry.” She smirks. “You’re just way too easy.”

“I hate this stupid ruffle,” he mutters, but she knows he means it good-naturedly. Last year, she could never have imagined a version of Zuko who would’ve willingly submitted to a velvet frock-coat with a neck ruffle on his birthday, but his edges have softened as they’ve become closer, and she can sense the affection behind his annoyance now.

She’s going to respond, but she can’t once they’re called and the opening piano arpeggios of “Satisfied” float from the speakers. She doesn’t have to stretch to smile, even through the relatively uninteresting elements that begin the program – the dance spin and a stationary lift set to a piece of music that no other elements fit – typically wouldn’t give her much to be excited about.

She isn’t sure if it’s the music or the choreography, or the mere fact that skating a program she hates always makes the one she doesn’t look more appealing, but she can’t remember ever running through this program without an unwavering smile. Every tempo change and shift in the mood requires a slight tweak in her expression, of course, but she’s pretty sure she’s incapable of looking entirely angsty even when playing a pining Elise Renee Goldberry (perhaps the fact that she can’t relate hurts her chances) – she hopes that _winsome_ does the trick in moments like that.

Her face usually hurts by the steps in hold, which is perfectly bearable. If the audience’s reactions to even the smallest things are any indication, they’re soaking up her joy like a sponge. Even Zuko, who’s not the biggest fan of this character-heavy free dance or its ridiculous costume (he’d nearly choked when he saw the throat ruffle for the first time), pulls her in for one of his _this-is-great-isn’t-it?_ hugs when they finish.

He has different hugs for different occasions and emotions and outcomes of programs, and she knows very well what this one means. “Happy with that?” she asks.

“Mmhm.” He nods against her shoulder. “The neck ruffle is still stupid, though.”

She pulls away, laughing, one hand pressed to his chest. “Happy birthday, Zee,” she laughs, and she gathers from the way he beams in response that he’s as happy right now as she is.

**

**_October 2019_ **

**_Skate Canada International_ **

**_Vancouver, Canada_ **

**_After the Free Dance_ **

_My room at 8. Don’t be l8_ __

Zuko’s spent an embarrassing amount of time staring at that text and its immediate successor: _wear sweats._

He has _no_ idea what that means, but he’s not about to say no, so he’s at Katara’s door at seven fifty-eight, just to be safe, in joggers and the worn-out Junior Development Camp 2013 t-shirt that he somehow hasn’t outgrown (there is _one_ perk to having finished growing at 16, and this shirt is it) and which he knows Katara particularly loves to bury her face in (and steal). He knocks, unsure what to expect, and is a little embarrassed by the relief he feels when he sees her dressed in sweats and an oversized sweater herself. _Good. So she’s not throwing a party._ “Um…hi?”

She smiles softly. “Happy birthday, Zee,” she says, opening the door for him with one hand and holding out a bag of Fire Flake Doritos with the other. And he can’t help himself – the grin on his face is picture-day goofy, but his girlfriend is handing him Fire Flake Doritos and she’s probably going to snuggle with him and, somehow, this is all he’s ever wanted in life.

“Are…are these for me?”

“ _Zuko.”_

“Right.” He shakes himself. “May I?”

“Of course.” Katara’s dimples finally make an appearance – he _loves_ those dimples – as she gestures him in. “I, um…wanted to celebrate your birthday, but I thought you’d want something quiet, so I…um.” She looks down at her bare feet. “Well, um. I rented _Pride and Prejudice.”_

“Kay…”

“I’m sorry if you’re tired, or you just wanted to stay in and read or something, and you can totally leave if you-“

“ _Kay.”_

She finally looks up. “Yeah?”

“I _love_ you.”

She bites her bottom lip like she always does when she’s pleased. “Do you like it?”

“I’m going to kiss you,” he says, because it seems a perfectly legitimate response.

“Okay,” she laughs, stepping closer so he can set his hands at her waist like she likes him to. Her nose brushes his as she tilts her face up towards his. “I had to ask Azula for advice, you know.”

“Don’t talk about my sister when I’m about to kiss you, Kay.”

“You really love that nickname, don’t you?”

“Are you _stalling,_ Miss Nutaraq?”

“’Course not. Just curious.”

“I do,” he says, and, impatient as ever, he leans in to kiss her before she can keep talking. She brings her hand to rest against his cheek when they part, her forehead pressed against his.

“I might,” she says, “have invited a few of our friends.”

“How many is ‘a few’?” Zuko’s too happy to care as much as he normally would.

“Just a few. Toph and Aang, who told Sokka, who’s driving up with Suki to crash…” she pauses. “And your sister.”

_Of course._

“Did she ask you to?”

“No, but it was obvious that she missed you, and you need to have a life outside of me.” Katara fixes a mussed-up lock of his hair. “She’ll be nice, I promise.”

“She…misses me?”

“I think she feels a little left out now that you’re always with me,” Katara tells him. “So I told her she could come, and she told me she was bringing vodka.” She shakes her head. “Did you know that Azula had a fake ID?”

“Are you _surprised?”_ He shakes his head. “She doesn’t even drink. If she does, it’s probably just for the thrill of getting caught.”

“Well, that’s a thing, then.” Katara takes his hand to lead him to the still-made bed, a thousand times more luxurious even in this business hotel than the thrift store mattress she sleeps on at home. She sits against the pillows, door propped for the rest of their friends, and smiles when her boyfriend predictably flops back against her. She starts the movie, because there’s no chance in any universe that anyone’s going to be paying attention to it once their friends turn up. Zuko buries his face in her shirt, not bothering to watch, and she strokes his hair absentmindedly, watching the screen until he speaks.

“’Tara?” he asks, his voice muffled.

“Yeah?”

He clings to her waist like a limpet. “Have I told you lately that I love you?”

“Several times in the last hour,” she replies, then bends to kiss the crown of his head. “And I love you, too.”

“No, I _actually_ don’t get it,” he says, his hands finding their way to her shoulders.

“Don’t get what?”

“How I got so lucky,” he says. “Remember that night that I carried you back to your room?”

She smiles. “In Ann Arbor?”

“Yeah.” He raises his face, and props himself up on his elbows on either side of her. “The whole time, I was just watching you and thinking that I had to be the luckiest man alive.”

“Zuko…”

“What? Blushing?” he teases, poking the dimple in her flushed cheek. “Wow. Glad to know I’ve still got it.”

“Oh, shut _up,”_ she laughs, leaning in to kiss him – brief, sloppy, perfect – before he continues.

“No, I’m serious,” he says, though he’s still smiling. “You’re so much more than I deserve.”

“I could say the same of you,” Katara replies truthfully.

  
“Then can we just agree that we’re both lucky and leave it at that?”

“Yeah.” A knock sounds at the door, which isn’t even latched, but Katara doesn’t pay it any mind. “Yeah, I think we can.”

The look on Aang Tsering’s face when he walks in to find them kissing as if their lives depend on it is rather priceless, though only in hindsight.

“Uh. Um.” His wide eyes take in the scene with growing horror and he nearly drops the bag of fruit gummies in his hand. “Happy birthday?”

Zuko and Katara skitter apart like teenagers caught behind the lockers, flushed and more than suitably embarrassed. “Um. Thanks,” Zuko says, thankful it was Aang who walked in on that and not Azula. “Uh…come on in?”

“We have fruit gummies,” Toph announces, hurling the bag towards the bed but hitting a lamp instead. It’s bolted to the nightstand, but its lampshade teeters precariously upon impact. “Please accept this token of our appreciation of your existence.”

Zuko leans across the nightstand to pick up the bag, which has fallen to the floor. “Thanks,” he grunts, stretching as far as his body will allow to retrieve the gummies. “Uh…take a seat wherever, I guess.”

Toph promptly pulls Aang to the floor. The mirrored closet doors shake as they both settle in against them. The movie hasn’t paused, and both pretend to watch, even though Toph can’t see it and Aang doesn’t really know or care what’s going on; as Sokka and Suki file in, Katara takes advantage of their distraction to gesture to Zuko.

“Did you think I was going to let you go without your annual quota of birthday snuggles?” she shakes her head, opening her arms. “Come here.”

Zuko’s never been happier to follow instructions in his _life._ And though he’d initially been skeptical of the whole idea, it begins to warm to him once Azula shows up with a bottle of vodka that Sokka makes a significant dent in by himself, and when he begins to drunkenly argue with her (and, later, Aang, who Zuko notes with satisfaction has his arm around Toph) about which of various anime characters Zuko hasn’t heard of would win in a fight.

  
“Thank you, Katara,” is all he can say at the end of the night, when an exhausted Aang and Toph retreat back to their rooms. Azula’s passed out in an armchair, and Suki is dragging Sokka, in an unfortunate state, back down to their car so she can drive him home to Caldera; only he and Katara remain awake, holding each other even though the movie is long over and a depressingly empty bag of Fire Flake Doritos lies on the nightstand next to them.

  
She wordlessly kisses his forehead.

_You’re welcome,_ he knows she’s saying. _I love you._


	12. Sonnet 81

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Did you REALLY think that I would let them off as easy as I have been in the last few chapters? (I AM SORRY.) 
> 
> Also, I'm aiming for 2-3 weekly updates now, so in addition to our regular Saturday postings, I'm going to aim for Wednesday and Sunday ones as well. The only one that is guaranteed, though, is Saturday, as my schedule might not allow for more than that.

**_Flying – en route to Shanghai_ **

**_Cup of China_ **

**_November 2019_ **

****

“So, I’ve been thinking.”

“That’s never good.” Katara closes the physiology textbook she’d insisted upon bringing along for the plane ride and turns to Zuko, in the window seat beside her. “What’s up?”

“I, um…” he shifts a little uncomfortably, pausing to dog-ear his place in the book he’s reading. “I’ve been thinking about, um, what I want to do after skating.”

Katara’s eyes widen. “You mean, like…retirement?”

“Not for a long time, don’t worry,” he reassures her with a hand on her arm. “I just realized that I, uh…didn’t really have a plan for…after that.”

“And what did you decide?” she asks, curious but a little wary.

“Well, see, uh, that’s the thing.” She can’t remember the last time he was so nervous around her. “I don’t really know, but I sorta do know one thing, and it’s…kinda big.”

“Hey, you can tell me.” Katara takes his hand, tracing the lines of his palm, but she pauses when it occurs to her that perhaps he’s suddenly short of words because the decision he’s come to relates to her. “Is it…something I’m involved in?”

“Well, I’d like you to be, but that’s not exactly what I mean.” With his free hand, he cups the outside of hers. “I…I want to go back to school.”

_Oh._ Katara’s shoulders droop with relief. “Oh! That’s…that’s great!”

“Yeah, uh…I know it would be a lot, but you’re making the full-time student thing work, so…why couldn’t I, right?”

“Yeah, definitely!” Katara says brightly, holding off on the million questions she wants to ask. “For English again?”

He nods. “My major wasn’t the problem last time.”

“So what was?” she’s never asked before, which surprises her now that she thinks about it.

“I dunno, I guess I was just kind of…unmotivated,” Zuko replies. “I was pretty burnt out when I started college. Didn’t really care enough to do what I had to do, you know?”

“And now you do?” she asks.

  
“Yeah, I think so.”

She smiles, one he’s not entirely meant to see. “I’m glad.”

“What, that I want to go back to college?”

She shakes her head. “That you found it.”   
  
“What exactly is ‘it’?”

This time she means to share her smile. “Your reason.”

He doesn’t speak for a moment after that, considering her words.

_She was my reason,_ he realizes, and when he blinks, it seems as if he’s seeing something entirely new.

“I am, too,” he finally says.

“And do you know what might be next?” Katara turns back to her physiology textbook, but he knows she’s still listening. “Like, if you start now as an undergrad, how does that play into your long-term plans?”

“Well, um, it’s probably going to take more than four years to finish a bachelor’s degree while we’re training,” he says. Katara knows he’s stalling – that isn’t what she asked – but she doesn’t press him. “And, I, well…back when I was in college before, I guess I really wasn’t sure what I was going to do, but…”

She raises her eyes again, coaxing his upwards. “Yeah?”

“Okay, I know this is gonna sound weird, but hear me out.” _There’s that nervous look again,_ Katara notes. “Um…I actually think I might want to be an English teacher.” He clears his throat, clearly embarrassed at the admission. “Like, in a high school.”

  
“That doesn’t sound weird at all.” _Unexpected, but not weird._ Katara can’t help but smile at the idea. “That’s…actually really sweet.”

“I know it’s, like, not what you’d expect, because, I mean…Zuko Nishimura, not the biggest people guy, y’know? But, I, uh, I had this English teacher, Mr. Roku, when I was in 10th grade, and he, uh. He’s a lot of the reason I, um…I love books and stuff. And I used to hang out in his room every day at lunch, even after his class was over, and he was, like, a lifesaver, and he was so passionate about English and I remember thinking that I wanted to…do that.”

He stops to catch his breath.

“Everyone thinks I’d be bad at it,” he says once he has, more than a little defeated.

Katara furrows her brows. “Who?”

“Oh, you know. My old professors and stuff.”

“Zuko…” she reaches for his hand. “ _I_ don’t think you’d be bad at it.”

“They had a point,” he says, but he doesn’t sound as convinced as he did seconds before. “I mean, I dropped out of school, and I’m here saying I want to spend every single day at a school until I retire-“

“You said yourself that you didn’t actually drop out because you disliked the academic part of it,” Katara points out. “And, I mean, I’ve never met anyone who loves classic lit more than you do.”

“I mean, I wouldn’t say that, but…sure?”

“Zuko. Honey. You have at least sixteen anthologies of poetry and they’re all annotated.” The more she thinks about this, the more convinced she becomes. “Not for a class, or anything else. Just because _you_ love this stuff.”

A stiff blush rises in his cheeks. “Okay, if you’re talking about that book of Pablo Neruda sonnets-“

“I am definitely talking about the Pablo Neruda sonnets.” Katara smirks.

“We are not revisiting that.”

“We are definitely revisiting that.”

“No, we’re not.”

She concedes. “So, you’d get a BA in English?”

  
Zuko nods. “And then a teaching credential,” he explains. “Probably about six years in total.”

“And you’d do that while we were training?”

“I’m not walking out, Kay.” He reaches for both of her hands across the fold-down tray table and squeezes them. “I’m not going to quit on you for this.”

“Okay.” She lets out a shaky breath. “And you’re sure you want to take that on?”

  
“I am.” He shrugs. “I’m not going to coach, so I kind of need to have job skills, and…I like this idea.”

“And I support you in liking this idea.”

“You really think I’d be good at it?”

“Well, there’s probably going to be a learning curve, but…you’re caring and passionate and knowledgeable, and I have a feeling you’ll get the hang of it.” Shifting again, Katara leans her head against his shoulder. “And you’ll have me cheering you on, okay?”

He reaches for the hand that rests closest to his. “So you’re in it for the long haul, huh?”

“I thought we’d already established that I’m not giving you up, Zee.”

She feels his cheek press against her hair. “Then I don’t plan on giving you up, either.”

**

**_Arrival – Shanghai_ **

**_Cup of China Day 1_ **

Ice dance partners with enough experience and enough commitment can read each other like books. Every fractional change in demeanor or expression or movement means something – a tiny quirk of the lips, slight favoritism of the left leg over the right when warming up – and partners are supposed to know what it all means. That, Zuko prides himself on: he speaks Katara’s language, and he hers, and though he’s never been the most gifted reader of social cues, he knows _hers._ And he knows when she’s not at her best before her struggles are anywhere close to perceptible to anyone else.

He notices the strange shift in her posture – almost impossible to spot, given that it’s still as straight as ever, only pitched forwards a fraction as if she’s arching her back – within a single practice session at their second Grand Prix. It’s possible that it’s some sort of residual stiffness after the twelve-hour flight they took yesterday, but he doubts it.

  
“You feeling okay?” he asks as soon as they leave, knowing she won’t be honest if they’re still at practice and she thinks he’ll make her leave early if she admits that she’s in pain. (He _would,_ of course.)

Her expression stays neutral, but there’s a barely-noticeable beat in which fear flickers in her irises. Zuko doesn’t miss it.

“Yeah,” she says evenly, though there’s a hint of strain in her voice and a little too much relief in her face when she leans back in her seat on the shuttle back to the hotel. “Why, was I off today?”

“You were kinda carrying yourself strangely,” he tells her. “Kind of like your back hurt.”

She stiffens at that, but her tone doesn’t reflect the change in her posture. “Well, a little bit, but it’s probably nothing to worry about.”

“You have to be careful, Kay,” he says gently.

“My back was never one of the things I injured,” she deflects. “It’s not anything flaring up.”

“Even if it wasn’t an old injury, you can’t ignore it.” He resists the urge to pull her closer, wary of jostling her when she could be hurt. “If you’re in pain, you have to say something, all right?”

“It’s _my_ injury. Shouldn’t I be the one to decide when it’s time to stop?”

  
“Um, considering that your answer would be _never,_ I really don’t think that’s smart.”

Katara sulks. This, too, is unusual.

“Does it hurt?” he tries again. This time, at least, Katara looks up at him.

“Yeah,” she says quietly. “A little bit.”

“Do you have something with you to help with that? An ice pack or a heating pad or something?”

“I think I just need to rest. Flying always leaves me a little stiff,” she says. She’s lying and he knows it and she knows that he knows it, but she still can’t find it within herself to admit that something might really be wrong.

“Okay, but _please_ tell me if it gets worse,” he says. She nods weakly. “And…will you at least let me get you some ice?”

The outside drizzle picks up, lashing the shuttle’s windows. They stop for a moment to listen before Katara responds.   
  
“Okay,” she acquiesces. “I don’t know where you’re going to find an ice pack, but okay.”

“Plastic bag and ice from the ice machine wrapped in a towel.” He glances out the window, then back at Katara. “One time in high school, someone ran into me at regionals and I had this super painful bruise where her elbow dug into my side, so Iroh made me one of those. It’s surprisingly effective.”

“All right, Dr. N,” she teases, though he can tell her heart isn’t in it. “If you say so.”

She does her best to pretend that she’s feeling normal, but her back only seems to have gotten stiffer by the time they arrive at the hotel. Normally, she’d swat his hand away if he offered it to help her down the steps; now she accepts it, and he doesn’t miss the weight against it as she leans into him for support. And as they walk through the lobby, he notices that she’s almost limping, still leaning against him as much as she can. Worry wraps around his lungs like a blood pressure cuff, tightening with every movement. Something isn’t right here, and he’s not sure that a makeshift ice pack is going to solve it.

But right now, a makeshift ice pack is all he has to offer, so he returns to her room after a few minutes of searching for the ice machine with one of the gallon-sized resealable bags she uses for her toiletries, filled with crushed ice. She’s lying on her stomach, head turned to one side and hair splayed out against the white bedspread, eyes closed.

“It’s, like, a little over halfway up my spine, a little to the right,” she tells him. “I’ll tell you when you have it in the right place.”

Gingerly, he presses against a spot in the region she’s describing. “Here?”

“Little further right.”

  
He follows. “Here?”

“Down a little.”

He doesn’t need to ask again when he puts pressure on the spot that she’s describing and she winces. He places the ice pack and frowns. “Shouldn’t a nursing student take better care of herself than this?” he asks.

“This nursing student is _fine.”_

“Katara, you could barely walk just now. That isn’t fine.”

“Okay, I’ll _be_ fine.”

  
“Not if you don’t stop and make sure you aren’t seriously hurt.”

“I’m not,” she insists. “I had a little back pain after my last injury, but it wasn’t a big deal. This is probably just that cropping up again.”

“Well, your neck and shoulder got all messed up, so I’m not surprised.” He resists the urge to prod at the injured area any more than he already has. “But that also means that you need to be taking this seriously.”

  
“What I _need_ to do is _compete,_ Zuko. We didn’t fly all the way to China to-“

“Katara, your health has to come first.”

  
“Sometimes” – she tries to sit up but winces and flops back against the pillows – “you have to make sacrifices.”

“Not like this, Kay.”

“It’ll be better tomorrow.”

“If it has anything to do with your last injury, it might not be.”

“But-“

“ _Katara.”_

  
“Fine,” she huffs.

A moment passes. Zuko, standing at the foot of her bed, makes no move to leave.

“Sit with me?” she asks, reaching one of her hands in his general direction, and he softens – some things he can’t resist, even when she’s being reckless and difficult and he wishes she’d see reason.

“Yeah.” He takes a seat beside her at the edge of the bed and smooths his flat palm over her hair, then the side of her back that isn’t injured. “I’ll stay.”

All he does for the next two hours is watch her breathe.

**

**_Shanghai_ **

**_Cup of China_ **

**_Rhythm Dance_ **

****

Katara’s still stiff when she wakes the morning of the rhythm dance, and grimly, she wonders if the transitive property applies to psychology. It seems like it should be: if she’s terrified of one thing, shouldn’t that take the place of the other thing she’s worried about? Maybe she won’t have her tango anxiety if she’s even more anxious about the pain she’s found herself in.

Because it’s not like she says it is.

It’s easy enough to play it off: her last injury left her with a pain tolerance beyond anyone’s expectations, and it’s not like she’s immobile. But it’s only gotten worse since the first barely-there twinges at Skate Canada. After they took the bronze medal and realized they had a shot at qualifying for the Grand Prix Final, the final event of the Grand Prix series where the top six highest-performing teams in each discipline compete, their training took on new intensity, and those twinges became an ever-present ache. The longer she lets it go on, the harder it becomes to ignore, and the more fear begins to gnaw at her stomach. She’s a nursing student – hard as she tries to pretend that it’s nothing, she knows what these things mean.

That’ll get her mind off the Tango Romantica if anything will.

  
If Zuko notices that her characteristic nerves are gone by the time they’re called onto the ice, though, he doesn’t say anything. She suspects, from the pensive look on his face, that he might have a sense that something is up, but he doesn’t mention it, and for that, she is grateful. Besides, this is, in some ways, ideal. Her pinched expression when she twists or bends can easily be played off as passion, and the forced straightness of her back doesn’t look odd in a tango, where the line and shape of the body are so important. She lets herself get lost in the nuances of the performance because, suddenly, this mortifying public declaration of her feelings for her partner isn’t the most unpleasant thing she could be thinking about, and every movement of her body is sharp and proud and pointed.

It is the most exquisite tango they perform that season. But no one realizes that the moisture in Katara’s eyes when it is done is pain, not relief.

“You’re really getting this,” Zuko comments as they make their way over to the Kiss-and-Cry, giving her bicep a squeeze. “Where’d that come from?”

  
She doesn’t respond, but he need only look at her face, twisted up in pain now that she doesn’t have to hide it anymore, to know that all isn’t well.

“Wait…” he stops at the boards. “Is this your back?”

  
She feels like her spine might collapse under the weight of another lie, and she nods.

He shakes his head, and though he tries to play it off as much as she does, he lets her lean on his arm so that she doesn’t have to support her weight on her own. Iroh catches on quickly and his eyes widen. “Are you all right?” he asks.

“Back pain,” she tells him. “It’ll pass. Always does.”

  
“What do you mean ‘always does’?” Iroh crosses his arms. “Is this a regular occurrence?”

Katara winces, unsure whether because this is going to be a painful conversation or because _everything_ is painful right now. “No, it’s recent,” she says. “Like, really recent. Probably just slept on it wrong.”

She _hates_ herself for saying that, but the panic that knots her stomach at the idea of withdrawing from the competition keeps her from honesty. She knows they’ll suggest that they withdraw if she admits that she’s in so much pain; it’s a risk she’s unwilling to take, and more so after the rhythm dance they’ve just had.

“We’ll talk about this later,” Iroh sighs. “Excellent, though. That’s the best I’ve seen you skate this program.”

At that, Katara has to smile. “I guess back pain is good for the nerves,” she jokes as they take their seats in the Kiss-and-Cry.

She knows immediately from the way her partner and coach’s faces fall that it was the wrong thing to say. And it’s terrifying, watching herself spiral into habits that she, as a nursing major, has a professional duty to warn others against, but she’s even more afraid of having this taken from her now that it’s finally _good –_ she has the perfect partner, the perfect momentum, the perfect setup for a good season.

She can’t let that go.

Their scores slot into place on the jumbotron above them – a season’s best by six points, into first with two remaining teams to skate.

No, she can’t.

**

“I don’t understand why you’re doing this to yourself!”

“Oh, really? You don’t _understand_ why I can’t afford to lose momentum? Why I can’t give up now when I’ve been working towards this my entire _life?_ Are you _actually_ telling me that you can’t understand why withdrawing would be the worst possible decision I could make right now?”

“The _worst possible decision_ would be to keep putting stress on an injury that’s obviously more serious than you say it is!”

“Zuko, we’re still a new team, and we’re _just_ starting to get situated – what’s it going to say about us if we just _stop?”_

“That you’re willing to take care of yourself like you should be doing anyway?”

“ _Zuko.”_

“Kay, what matters here isn’t _momentum.”_

“…you realize that we compete in the most biased, reputation-based sport there is, right?”

“And what does that have to do with anything?”

“Judges don’t throw out winning scores to skaters who don’t have the track record to support them!”

“Um. Have you _seen_ a ladies event recently?”

“Have _you?”_

Zuko changes tactics. “Look, I know this is hard, I really do. But you could barely _walk_ today, ‘Tara.” He steps forward and tries to take her hands, but she swats them away. “You’re _not_ fine, and I’d be a terrible partner and an even worse boyfriend if I didn’t try to stop you from making it worse.”

“You’d be a worse one if you saw that I had a chance at the thing I’ve spent my entire life working for and let me give it up.”

She doesn’t stay to see his face fall, and even before she’s out of the room, bile rises in her throat at the realization of what she’s said – that, for the first time in nearly a year, she’s gotten them into the kind of fight that can’t be resolved in five minutes with a kiss and an “I can’t stay mad at you.” Neither of them is going to back down, and she knows it was a cheap shot; she wants to turn before she’s even out of the room and apologize and promise him she’ll stop before she makes anything worse.

But she knows she’ll lose her resolve if she does that.

She lets him watch her leave.

**

**_Shanghai_ **

**_Cup of China_ **

**_Free Dance_ **

****

“I’m sorry about last night.”

There’s more friction in the air between Katara and Zuko as they take the ice for their free dance as there has been since they partnered up, and part of him wants to slump with the relief of having heard her address it – having heard her apologize – but he knows he can’t. If she’s going to insist upon skating, he has to keep her safe, and that’s going to take all of his focus.

“Thanks,” he replies. They take their starting position. “Be careful.”

He wants to squeeze her hand, but he doesn’t feel like he even _can_ when they’re like this and she’s insisting upon running herself off the road. And this free dance is a new kind of disaster without her ever-present enthusiasm: it’s her favorite, and without Katara’s enthusiasm, his own is pitifully sapped.

He feels the constraint of his neck ruffle especially acutely.

There’s nothing off about their skating, which is in itself a miracle, but he knows that they’re both too distracted to get involved in their performance at all. Yesterday’s pain and worry weren’t enough to keep either of them from engaging in it, but today’s tension most certainly is – all Zuko can think about is their fight last night, and the injury that sparked it. He _has_ to make sure she doesn’t get hurt; he can barely look at her. He needs to make sure that _he_ doesn’t make a fatal mistake, because it is almost always he who loses control when it counts; he has to look out for her, too. (He nearly crashes into the wall twice during their no-hold step sequence because he’s watching to make sure that _she_ doesn’t – it’s not the most effective competitive strategy.)

By the time they’re back in hold, he can feel the stiffness in her arms. It’s so clear from the tension in her muscles alone that she’s holding herself upright by sheer force of will – the fact that she’s still smiling, somehow, is almost unbelievable – that Zuko feels more than a little bit compelled to march her off the ice and to the nearest medic. But he can’t and won’t – she’s made her choice, and he doesn’t know if they’ll ever recover if he undermines it.

_One more minute – you can finish this._

The few remaining elements after the steps in hold are, unfortunately, set on a crescendo in the music, which makes it infinitely more difficult to hide the fact that Katara is about to collapse. Her face is pinched and flushed, and Zuko hasn’t seen this much fear in her eyes before the entrance to a lift in months. 

It’s not hard to put the pieces together. _This has to be a byproduct of her last injury,_ he realizes. _That must be getting to her again._ Both breathe audible sighs of relief when her feet are safely on the ground again, though it doesn’t help much when this section features both of their lifts back-to-back (absolutely horrible planning, two lifts at the end of the program when they’re both exhausted, but they’d fit best there). 

When the music _finally_ fades, it is all but impossible to mistake the look on her face for anything but pain, and she crumples into his arms, her eyes moist again.

“It _hurts,”_ she sobs, unwilling or unable to keep up the façade or maybe both. “I’m sorry and you were right and I-“

“Hey, it’s fine,” he murmurs, his protective instincts kicking in unbidden. He’d normally rub her shoulders but this time, he sticks to her middle back, careful not to hit the spot that’s hurting her. “I mean, no, it isn’t, and you shouldn’t be skating, but I’ve got you, okay?”

“I’m sorry,” Katara sniffles. “I should’ve listened and I shouldn’t have said that and I’m _sorry.”_

“It’s all right.” He offers her arm again and she gratefully accepts, leaning almost her full weight against it. “Let’s just get you off, and then we’ll talk, okay?”

She barely has the energy to be thrilled at the second-place marks she’d wanted so badly.

**

**_Back in Caldera_ **

**_Early November 2019_ **

****

“And this has been happening for…two months now?”

Katara nods. Dr. Jee’s brow furrows.

“You shouldn’t have competed like this.” He clucks his tongue.

“So my partner tried to tell me.” She casts her eyes down to the paper-covered exam table, wishing she hadn’t turned down Zuko’s offer to accompany her to the appointment. “I’m afraid I insisted.”

“Well, I’m going to have to ask that you don’t do that again.” Dr. Jee’s eyes are full of what could be pity or condescension. “Do you know anything about spinal fractures?”

Katara’s eyes widen, but she doesn’t say anything.

“I take it from that look that you understand, at very least, how serious they are.” Dr. Jee sighs. “After looking at your X-rays, it seems like the most likely explanation of this injury is that you fractured a vertebra in your fall two years ago which was minor enough to be asymptomatic at the time, but never healed properly. It then likely got worse with use, hence why it flared up now.” He pushes up his glasses. “You said your training had intensified around the time you started having this problem?”

“Yeah, it had.”

“Then that would probably explain it.” The doctor taps his pen against his clipboard.

“How long is the recovery time?” Katara’s skin feels too tight for her body.

“Well, that depends on whether or not you need surgery.” _Great. Just the word I was hoping_ not _to hear today._ “I’m going to send your X-rays along to an orthopedist to see what the best course of action might be, so we probably won’t know until she has a chance to take a look at them.” Dr. Jee doesn’t look too excited about what’s coming next. “But, regardless, you’re likely looking at at least twelve weeks off the ice.”

“Twelve… _weeks?”_

Katara thinks she might be sick.

“If you continue training, that recovery period will only get longer,” he warns her. “Especially given the rate at which your mobility has already declined.”

“I know.” She swallows hard. “It’s just a lot to take in, that’s all.”

“I know it is, and I’m truly sorry.” She doubts that. “But what ultimately matters most is your long-term health, and spinal injuries can be seriously harmful if you don’t address them as soon as they crop up.”

“I know that.” She tries not to snap, but it’s hard not to – partly because she’s reeling and partly because she can’t shake the sense that this doctor is condescending to her, somehow. “My partner said the same thing.”

“Mm. And he’d be right.” Dr. Jee begins to tap the clipboard again and the sound grates on Katara’s nerves more than it should. “But, if you take care of this now, you’ll probably be good to go by next season.”

_This season just started!_ She wants to protest. _We had a legitimate shot at the Grand Prix Final! We were going to crack the top ten at Worlds this year!_

But instead, all she says is, “okay. Thank you.”

The moment she’s back in her car, she leans her forehead against the steering wheel and finally lets herself cry.

**

“That’s…a long time.” Zuko pauses on the other end of the line. “Do…you want me to come over?”

  
_Yes._

“Um, I think I need to be alone right now.” _I can’t stand to face you like this._ “But thanks.”

“Well, let me know if anything changes, all right?” he asks. “Or if you need anything?”

  
“I will,” she says, though she doesn’t really believe it. She’s not sure whether the guilt of facing him when her own mistakes have ruined their chances would be greater than that of pushing him away, but she doesn’t want to risk it. “Thanks.”

It’s for the best – she knows all too well what happens to partners whose usefulness falters. She learned that lesson long ago and she doesn’t ever intend to forget it.

“Okay. Love you.”

“Love you too.” She has to bite her lip so her voice won’t break. “Talk later.”

She has little to do but glance aimlessly around the room when she hangs up, and her eyes land on her bookshelf. It’s small and holds mostly school books with a few that Zuko has loaned her, but one in particular catches her eye this time. It’s a shimmery tan that borders on gold, with _100 Love Sonnets_ written across the spine of the book jacket in spidery black script, and she’s not even sure how it came to be there – maybe he’d brought it over to read and forgotten to bring it home. Regardless, she picks it up and begins to thumb aimlessly through its annotated pages until she stops on one. _LXXXI,_ it reads – Sonnet 81. She doesn’t read so much as she skims the lines, stopping where Zuko had underlined passages, reading the notes he’s left in the margins in his rounded hand, further softened by the dullness of the pencil he’d used to make them.

 _And now you’re mine. Rest with your dream in my dream._ The sonnet’s first line is underlined, and her eye travels across the page to its annotation – it’s only a single letter but it’s hard to mistake the meaning of a K.

An unwanted sob breaks the surface. _Rest with your dream in my dream –_ was that not what she’d done? What he had?

_Without you, I am your dream, only that, and that is all,_ he’d underlined at the bottom of the page – the first and last lines, both marked “K.”

_Maybe this wasn’t my dream,_ he’d marked. _Maybe_ she _was._

_Maybe she was._

Maybe someone _could_ stick it out through the worst of her nights. Maybe someone _could_ love her heart and not her potential.

She bites her lip to restrain another sob, and before she knows what she’s doing, she sets the book aside, unconcerned that it folds closed as soon as she does, and picks up her phone. Her fingers have never worked faster than they do to dial Zuko’s number. He picks up almost immediately, and she realizes with a jolt that she doesn’t even know what she’d meant to say when she decided to call him.

“Kay?” he asks. “Do you want me to come over after all?”

She lets another sob wrack her shoulders. How could she have missed it? How could she not have heard the sincerity in his voice when he offered, how badly he’d _wanted_ to be there for her?

How could she have been so foolish as to let herself forget that Zuko has told her a thousand times and with all possible sincerity that he isn’t going to leave?

“ _Without you, I am your dream, only that, and that is all,”_ she reads, voice wavering.

“ _That’s_ where I left my Neruda sonnets?”

“ _Zuko.”_

“Right, sorry. Do you need me to come over?”

She might as well.   
  
“Yes,” she tells him. “Please.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> That last scene courtesy of my recent obsession with Pablo Neruda.


	13. Lean On Me

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I took some liberties with the science of back injuries here. Like, a lot. Other than the procedure itself (which I researched to make sure I was getting at least one thing right), there's pretty much nothing to this that is at all reflective of reality (except that lying about being family to get into the hospital is a thing - my mom did it once, pretending she was our friend's aunt so she could visit him). But still. 
> 
> I think this one is kinda cute? Also, this fic becomes more wish fulfillment-y by the day. Whoops.

**December 2019**

Katara has to brace herself against the doorframe just to stay steady enough to fish her phone out of her purse, and that’s barely enough when her hands are shaking. Sokka stands as soon as she returns to the waiting room – he doesn’t trust her to drive herself, apparently, and he skipped Multivariable Calculus to take Katara to her appointment in spite of her protests – but she waves him off.

She doesn’t have to explain what she’s trying to do as she dials. Zuko picks up no more than five seconds after the first ring.

“’Tara? You okay?”

“Appointment, remember?” she forces down the lump in her throat, but it’s still obvious in the strained tone of her voice that it’s there, fighting to make its presence known.

“Of course. With the orthopedist, right?”

  
She nods, even though there’s really no point. “Yeah.”

  
She almost hopes that if she says nothing, he’ll make the leap on his own.

“What’s the verdict?” he asks gently. “Surgery?”

Katara closes her eyes as if this can’t touch her if she can’t see the pre-op papers in her hand. “Yeah.”

“I’m so sorry.”

  
“It’s probably better this way,” she replies, her voice beginning to break. “And, I mean…what can you do, right?”

“Do you know when it is yet?” Zuko knows by now that, in a crisis, it’s best to divert her attention to practical details so she won’t break down. “Is it scheduled?”

“January 2nd.” She laughs mirthlessly. “Figures, doesn’t it?”

“That’s just cruel.”

“Isn’t it?” She doesn’t bother trying not to cry.

“You’re with Sokka, right? You can get home okay?”

“Yeah. I’m okay.”

“Are you in pain?”

  
“I’m _always_ in pain, Zuko.”

“Are you in more pain than usual?”

“Not really.” That isn’t saying much, though. Even though Iroh put a moratorium on any and all training (for Katara, at least – Suki’s told her that Zuko still comes to practice sometimes, running next season’s patterns on his own) as soon as she got her diagnosis, she can’t avoid walking, whether across campus to classes or up the stairs to their apartment, and her back feels worse with every passing day.

“All right.” He takes a breath she can hear through the phone. “Call me if you need me, okay?”

The kind of gratitude that always makes her feel unbearably sappy bubbles up in her chest, makes her wish she could wrap this wonderful partner of hers in her arms and never let go. “I _always_ need you, Zee.”

“Would you like me to sleep on your living room floor, then? Because I can make that work.”

She smiles in spite of herself. “We haven’t vacuumed that rug in months. I wouldn’t wish that on anyone.”

“If you insist.”

  
“Will you be mad if I call you at weird times?”

“Kay, I have _nothing_ going on.”

“But _would_ you?”

“Of course not, Kay.” He sighs. “We normally see each other every day, and…I’m gonna miss that, I guess.”

  
“Me, too.”

“Hey, um, Katara? You’ve been standing there for ten minutes,” Sokka interrupts, arms crossed. “Can you please call your boyfriend later?”

“I take it your brother has to get going?” Zuko asks.

“Yeah, sorry. Text me?”

  
“Of course.”

“All right. See ya.” She hangs up after they’ve said their goodbyes and turns to Sokka. “Seriously?”

His face grows somber. “Surgery?”

She nods weakly. “January 2nd.”

“I’m so sorry, ‘Tara.” He extends his arms and tucks her under his chin, a little less careful not to squeeze too hard than he should be. “That sucks.”

“I thought you had class in half an hour,” she sniffles.

  
“I do, but my sister needs back surgery. It can wait.”

She’s too grateful to question the logic of that.

“Thanks, Sokka.” Her voice is hoarse now for no reason at all – it isn’t as if she’s worn it raw.

“’Course.” He gives her shoulders one last squeeze, which he seems to keep forgetting that he shouldn’t do. “But I actually do have class-“

“Then go,” she laughs tearfully, tugging his arm to tell him to move. “I’ll be okay for a few hours. Promise.”

“You sure?”

  
“I have half of the Cricket Club on speed-dial if I need anything,” she reassures him.

  
“And by that you mean you have _Zuko_ on speed-dial.”

“And Iroh,” she counters.

“Okay, but if he comes, he’s gonna bring Zuko, so that point is moot.” He unlocks his car and offers his arm to help Katara in, even though she never wants to admit that she needs it.

“Aang and Toph both said they’d stop by.”

“Aang and Toph can’t drive.” He pauses to consider before turning his key in the ignition. “And I _really_ don’t trust Toph to be responsible or Aang to not go along with whatever stupid thing she’s doing.” 

“Sokka, you _love_ Toph.”

He can’t deny that this is true: they haven’t exactly had much cause to interact, but he’s concluded from the handful of exchanges they’ve had that she’s easily his favorite Cricket Club skater besides Suki. Still, though, he doesn’t like it. “Not around my sister and her broken back, I don’t.”

“Okay, then I’ll call Suki.”

“Suki’s training.”

“You really believe that Suki wouldn’t come over if I needed her?” Katara has no intention of asking her to, but it’s the principle of the thing.

“She would, but you can’t ask that of her when there are more convenient people to call.” He gives her a pointed look. “Like your brother, who would _really_ love an excuse not to go to his Artistic Traditions of Southwest Asia class.”

“The class you’re currently rushing to get to?”

  
“Because I have no actual excuse not to go, and Professor Pathik is _terrifying?”_

“Professor Pathik is the least-attentive professor at that entire school, Sokka. He probably wouldn’t know you were gone.”

“Professor Pathik roasted me in front of the entire class because I couldn’t remember what the Bushel with Ibex Motifs was used for!”

“Because you didn’t do the reading, genius.” Katara rolls her eyes. “Honestly.”

“Well, no _duh._ It’s art history and I’m an engineering major.”

“…yeah, I’m calling my boyfriend.”

“If you two idiots find a way to make that spinal fracture worse-“

“ _Sokka!”_

“He’s paying for that surgery.”

Katara’s answering glare could cut metal.

**

**_2 New Messages from Kay <3 [December 19th, 2019 – 12:34 P.M.]:_ **

****

**_Kay <3 _ ** _hey Z_

 **_Kay <3: _ ** _you around?_

_[ **12:35 P.M.]**_

**_Zuko:_ ** _ofc_

 **_Zuko:_ ** _you ok?_

**_[12:35 P.M.]_ **

**_Kay <3: _ ** _is it stupid that I miss you?_

**_[12:35 P.M.]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _it’s been like a day_

**_[12:35]_ **

**_Kay <3: _ ** _yeah but like_

 **_Kay <3: _ ** _we’re literally always together_

**_[12:36]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _are you sure you don’t just miss skating?_

**_[12:36]_ **

**_Kay <3: _ ** _well that too_

 **_Kay <3: _ ** _but rn everything hurts and I just want one of your hugs ;-;_

**_[12:37]_ **

**_Zuko:_ **

****

**_[12:37]_ **

**_Kay <3:_** **🥺**

 **_Kay <3: _ ** _why are you so sweet?_

**_[12:38]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _would it be weird if I told you that I miss you too?_

**_[12:38]_ **

**_Kay <3: _ ** _no_

 **_Kay <3: _ ** _I don’t think it would be_

**_[12:38]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _two weeks, right?_

**_[12:38]_ **

**_Kay <3: _ ** _two weeks :/_

**_[12:39]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _I’m sorry :/_

**_[12:39]_ **

**_Kay <3: _ ** _my mom called today_

 **_Kay <3: _ ** _she and my grandma are gonna come stay with us for a few days to help out after the surgery_

**_[12:39]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _that’s good right?_

**_[12:39]_ **

**_Kay <3: _ ** _definitely_

 **_Kay <3: _ ** _nice to have a silver lining in all of this_

 **_Kay <3: _ ** _it’s been so long since I’ve seen Gran-Gran_

 **_Kay <3: _ ** _or Mom for that matter, but…less time_

**_[12:40]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _she was at Skate Canada right?_

**_[12:40]_ **

**_Kay <3: _ ** _Z…you talked to her…_

 **_Kay <3: _ ** _and my dad_

**_[12:41]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _Ik but it was like two seconds and they come to most comps_

 **_Zuko:_ ** _that’s happened several times, it could’ve been at any of them_

**_[12:41]_ **

**_Kay <3: _ ** _well uh_

 **_Kay <3: _ ** _rest assured it’s going to be a lot more than two seconds this time_

**_[12:42]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _should I be worried?_

**_[12:42]_ **

**_Kay <3: _ ** _nah_

 **_Kay <3: _ ** _I’ll put in a good word ;)_

**_[12:42]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _why does that scare me?_

**_[12:42]_ **

**_Kay <3: _ ** _what? I’m just gonna make sure she knows that you take good care of me :)_

**_[12:43]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _uhhh…_

**_[12:43]_ **

**_Kay <3: _ ** _omg z get your head out of the gutter_

 **_Kay <3: _ ** _I mean with my injury_

**_[12:43] Zuko_ ** _is typing._

 **_[12:44] Zuko_ ** _is typing._

 **_[12:45] Zuko_ ** _is typing._

 **_[12:46] Zuko_ ** _is typing._

**_[12:46]_ **

**_Kay <3: _ ** _not this again…_

**_[12:47]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _I knew that._

**_[12:47]_ **

**_Kay <3: _ ** _ofc you did ;)_

 **_Kay <3: _ ** _idiot_

 **_Kay <3: _ ** _I love you sm_

**_[12:48]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _ilym <3 _

**_[12:48]_ **

**_Kay <3: _ ** _I thought you hated emojis_

**_[12:48]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _I do_

 **_Zuko:_ ** _but the heart one is useful_

 ** _Zuko:_** _it comes in different colors!_ **🤍** 🤎 **❤** **💖🧡💛💞💚💙💜🖤💕**

**_[12:48]_ **

**_Kay <3: _ ** _you’re adorable_

 **_Kay <3: _ ** _even though the green one is like the ugliest thing I’ve ever seen_

**_[12:49]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _excuse me?!??_

 **_Zuko:_ ** _I won’t stand for this slander!!!!!_

**_[12:49]_ **

**_Kay <3: _ ** _you have that rage face on don’t you_

 **_Kay <3: _ ** _I hope you know that my present desire to squish it is almost unbearable_

**_[12:50]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _…_

 **_Zuko:_ ** _you are very strange_

**_[12:50]_ **

**_Kay <3: _ ** _cheek chub!!!!_

**_[12:50]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _*heavy sigh*_

 **_Zuko:_ ** _stupid babyface_

**_[12:50]_ **

**_Kay <3: _ ** _are you kidding me_

 **_Kay <3: _ ** _wanna squish your lil cheekies_ **🥺**

**_[12:51]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _you’re talking about the ones on my face, right?_

**_[12:51]_ **

**_Kay <3: _ ** _ZUKO. HEAD. GUTTER. OUT._

**_[12:51]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _ok I had to get back at you for the cheek squish somehow_

**_[12:51]_ **

**_Kay <3: _ ** _sigh_

**_[12:51]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _you brought it on yourself honey_

**_[12:51]_ **

**_Kay <3: _ ** _was…was that a sarcastic ‘honey’ or an old-married-couple ‘honey’?_

**_[12:51]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _both is good_

**_[12:51]_ **

**_Kay <3: _ ** _yk what, fair_

**_[12:52]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _oh btw I keep meaning to tell you_

 **_Zuko:_ ** _spring semester at the community college starts in two weeks_

 **_Zuko:_ ** _if…?_

**_[12:52]_ **

**_Kay <3: _ ** _!!!!!!  
_ **_Kay <3: _ ** _YAY_

**_[12:52]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _since we can’t train I thought this would be a good time to get some credits done_

 **_Zuko:_ ** _so I could get my associate’s and then transfer to CCU_

 **_Zuko:_ ** _?_

**_[12:52]_ **

**_Kay <3: _ ** _look at you, being proactive_

 **_Kay <3: _ ** _I’m so proud of you_ **💚**

**_what_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _oh? So now you like the green heart?_

****

**_[12:52]_ **

**_Kay <3: _ ** _no, but this calls for celebration_

 **_Kay <3: _ ** _best college boy_ 💚

**_[12:53]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _t_ _wo in one minute?_

 **_Zuko:_ ** _unprecedented_

****

**_[12:53]_ **

**_Kay <3: _ ** _you deserve it tho_

 **_Kay <3: _ ** _I wanna hear all about it!_

****

**_[12:53]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _Kay c’mon_

 **_Zuko:_ ** _you’re the first person I tell_

 **_Zuko:_ ** _well…everything_

****

**_[12:54]_ **

**_Kay <3: _ ** _I love it when you call me that_

 **_Kay <3: _ ** _don’t tell tho_

****

**_[12:54]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _what happened to “it’s not pronounced Kay-tara”?_

****

**_[12:54]_ **

**_Kay <3: _ ** _nothing, it’s just cute_

 **_Kay <3: _ ** _n e ways I was thinking_

****

**_[12:54]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _mmhm?_

****

**_[12:55]_ **

**_Kay <3: _ ** **_so yk how my surgery is the day after new years?_ **

****

**_[12:55]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _yeah?_

****

**_[12:55]_ **

**_Kay <3: _ ** _well I can’t eat for a few hours before_

 **_Kay <3: _ ** _which would mean that one of my last meals was dinner on new year’s eve_

****

**_[12:55]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _soooo…our anniversary dinner?_

****

**_[12:55]_ **

**_Kay <3: _ ** _Zuko…our anniversary is January 18 th_

**_Kay <3: _** _Nationals_ _SD_

**_Kay <3: _ ** _when you asked me to be your gf?_

****

**_[12:56]_ **

**_Zuko:_** _I meant of us like_

 **_Zuko:_ ** _getting out of the Christmas tree lot_

 **_Zuko:_ ** _ofc I didn’t forget that_

****

**_[12:56]_ **

**_Kay <3: _ ** _lollll we were so dumb_

 **_Kay <3: _ ** _but yeah I get what you mean_

 **_Kay <3: _ ** _so anyways I was thinking we could go somewhere nice?_

****

**_[12:56]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _I’m down_

 **_Zuko:_ ** **_i_** _f you’re feeling okay_

 **_Zuko:_ ** _getting ready to go out is a lot for you ik, we could stay in if it was easier for you_

 **_Zuko:_ ** _but I agree that we should have dinner_

****

**_[12:56]_ **

**_Kay <3: _ ** _actually ngl_

 **_Kay <3: _ ** _that sounds kinda nice_

 **_Kay <3: _ ** _can you cook?_

**_[12:56]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _I can boil pasta?_

 **_Zuko:_ ** _but Uncle can_

 **_Zuko:_ ** _has he ever made you his chicken katsu?_

**_[12:57]_ **

**_Kay <3: _ ** _no?_

 **_Kay <3: _ ** _is it good?_

**_[12:57]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _Kay._

 **_Zuko:_ ** _it is the culinary manifestation of bliss._

**_[12:57]_ **

**_Kay <3: _ ** _…would he make it for me?_

****

**_[12:57]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _ofc he would_

 **_Zuko:_ ** _pls he reminds me how happy he is that I have a gf like every other day_

**_[12:57]_ **

**_Kay <3: _ ** _AWW_

 **_Kay <3: _ ** _HE’S SO CUTE I LOVE HIM_

 **_Kay <3: _ ** _traits that Nishimuras have in common hehe_

**_[12:58]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _I think Azula would remove your larynx if you called her cute_

**_[12:58]_ **

**_Kay <3: _ ** _*Nishimura guys_

**_[12:58]  
Zuko: _ ** _pls don’t tell Uncle that_

 **_Zuko:_ ** _he’ll be insufferable_

**_[12:59]_ **

**_Kay <3: _ ** _;)_

**_[12:59]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _Kay…_

**_[1:00]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _Katara_

**_[1:01]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _Tara-_

**_[1:02]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _NUTARAQ_

**_[1:03]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _LOVE OF MY LIFE, JEWEL OF MY SOUL_

**_[1:03]_ **

**_Kay <3: _ ** _you rang?_

**_[1:04]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _IF YOU ARE DOING WHAT I THINK YOU’RE DOING SO HELP ME-_

**_[1:04]_ **

**_Kay <3: _ ** _nah dw just messing with you_

**_[1:04]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _oh okay_

 **_Zuko:_ ** _so anyways_

 **_Zuko:_ ** _NYE dinner?_

**_[1:05]_ **

**_Kay <3: _ ** _chicken katsu before the end of the world bby!_

****

**_[1:06]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _sounds like a plan_

**_[1:06]_ **

**_Kay <3: _ ** _yup!_

 **_Kay <3: _ ** _I have class at 1:15 and I gotta head out but later?_

**_[1:06]_ **

**_Zuko:_ ** _right ofc_

 **_Zuko:_ ** _have fun in *checks schedule* biomedical ethics_

 **_Zuko:_ ** _love you_

**_[1:06]_ **

**_Kay <3: _ ** _I def won’t_

 **_Kay <3: _ ** _but ily too <3 _

**

**New Year’s Eve**

“You look lovely tonight, Miss Nutaraq-“

“Please stop hitting on my girlfriend!” Zuko interrupts from a few doors down the hall.

“What, is paying a lady a compliment really such a crime?” Iroh shakes his head. “He’s a touchy one, my nephew.”

  
“Well, thank you.” Katara manages a smile that hopefully doesn’t look too much like a grimace on the receiving end, removing her slip-ons at the door. (She hadn’t bothered with heels when she knew she’d have to take them off inside anyways.) “Zuko tells me your cooking is something else. I can’t wait to try it.”

“Oh, he did, did he?”

“I believe his exact words were ‘culinary manifestation of heaven,’” she laughs. “Don’t tell him I told you.”

“I can _hear_ you, Kay.”

“I know you can!” she calls down the hall. “Are you going to join us?”

“Give me a second,” he calls back, and something that sounds like a headboard thumps against his wall. He curses under his breath as his closet door shakes on its tracks. “Coming!”

“You okay in there?” Iroh asks.

“I’m _fine!”_ he insists, and they hear his door slam closed behind him. He looks a little rumpled when he emerges from his bedroom, though he’s obviously made an effort with a pair of jeans that he hasn’t managed to rip yet and a red sweater vest that only he could pull off over a button-up. Katara bites her lip to keep the blood from rushing to her cheeks in front of Iroh, though she’s certain he’s seen her blush before.

“Hey,” she says, suddenly a little shy. “Um…you look nice.”

Zuko takes one look at her dark skinny jeans and oversized cowl sweater and swallows hard. “You, um. You too,” he stammers, and she almost laughs – they haven’t been this nervous around one another since their first run-through in Katara’s now-abandoned Rhythm Dance dress (the one that’s always struck her as just a little slinkier than it needs to be). But she feels strange doing so in Uncle’s presence, and she doesn’t.

Iroh seems to notice this, if the way he’s sizing them up is any indication.

After a moment of awkward silence, Zuko asks, “can we have a minute?”

Iroh winks, which is typical for him but still gives Katara pause. “I’ll be in the kitchen,” he tells them before he leaves and Zuko almost immediately crosses the room to Katara.

Neither of them has the chance to get words out before he kisses her, but neither of them want to. Katara’s hands lace at the back of his neck and his settle at the small of her back, and when they part for air, he presses his forehead to hers. “I missed you so much,” he murmurs.

“It’s been a week, Zuko,” she protests weakly, though she’s smiling too much to say it with any conviction.

“Yeah, but the last time I saw you was just to drop stuff off,” he says. “I need more Katara than that.”

“Mm. Feeling’s mutual.” She laughs, tilting her chin upwards to kiss him again. And she swears she’ll never forget the look on his face in that moment – like he’s been months on the road, and she is his homecoming.

“I brought you something,” he says after a moment that neither of them wants to end. “It’s…kinda stupid, but-“

“I’m sure it isn’t.” She touches his arm. “What is it?”

He reaches for an unrecognizable lump of black fabric sitting on the counter and shakes it out, holding it out to her. “I was thinking about last New Year’s Eve,” he explains. “And…I remember that the first, uh, the first move I made was giving you my jacket to wear.” He clears his throat. “This jacket. So I, um…”

  
She looks at him like nothing’s ever been wrong with her world and nothing ever will be, even though nothing’s been right with her world lately and it’s only going to get worse. He can’t mistake the look passing between them for anything but what she means it to be, and when she turns, he drapes the jacket across her shoulders. She turns again when he’s done and rises on her toes to kiss him, even though just walking is bad enough for her back.

“That might be the sweetest thing anyone’s ever done for me,” she admits.

“I find that hard to believe. It’s a _jacket.”_

“It isn’t the jacket.” She pulls it tighter around her shoulders. “It’s that you _remembered,_ and that you went to all this trouble to recreate a good night when I’m about to have a couple really bad ones, and…” she presses her hand to his chest. “That you love me enough to bother.”

He’s frozen, unsure what to say, until his hand takes the one pressed to his chest and clasps it. He kisses her knuckles with a sheepish smile. She closes her eyes, wishing fruitlessly that she could bottle up this feeling until she realizes that it’s probably good that she can’t – if she could drink in this moment at will, she’d never be sober. So she frees her hands and fists them in the lapel of his button-up.

“You’re the only guy I know who could make a sweater vest look good,” she says. It’s woefully inadequate and she knows it but the blush that rises in Zuko’s cheeks makes it almost worth ruining a moment like this with a comment like that.

“You’re the only girl I know who thinks sweater vests are attractive?” he offers, but neither can keep from laughing.

“What can I say? It’s cute.” She taps her finger to the end of his nose. “ _You’re_ cute.”

  
“Don’t even think about it, Kay.”

“Don’t even think about what?” she asks innocently.

“Oh, um, nothing. Nothing! It’s…not…anything,” he stammers, backing towards the fridge with a mildly panicked expression. “Don’t-“

Katara reaches across the growing distance between them to pinch his cheeks.

“-worry about it,” he sighs.

“They’re so _chubby!”_

“That’s _really_ not as amusing as you think it is.”

Nevertheless, he reaches out and presses both his palms to Katara’s cheeks, because he might as well see what all the fuss is about. He can’t help but laugh.  
  


“Oh, it isn’t?” Katara challenges.

  
“I… _might_ be able to see why that would amuse you,” he begrudgingly agrees.

**

“You were _not_ kidding about this.” Katara’s eyes widen appreciatively. “Thith thuff thould be illugub.”

“Well, I’m certainly glad you like it,” Iroh replies, glancing knowingly over at his nephew. “If this is the last thing you’re going to be eating for a while.”

“Better gorge myself tonight, right?” Katara says once she swallows, reaching for another cutlet.

She catches Zuko’s eyes across the table, and it’s hard to miss the quiet desperation in hers.

**

“Zee?”

“Mmhm?”

“I want to ask you something.”

  
He adjusts his jacket, which has started to slip down her shoulders, before he rests his chin against the top of her head again. She’s stretched out against him on the couch, and he’s a little bit worried that this position is bad for her back, but she doesn’t seem to be in pain so he lets it slide. “What is it?”

“I’m going to be off my feet for a while, right?” she asks.

“Yeah.” He squeezes her hip. “I know.”

“And I’m going to have class and stuff, but I’m taking less credits this semester than I usually would, and since I’m not training, I’m going to get really bored. And I know I can’t ask you to come over all the time when you start classes-“

“Yes you can.”

“I’m not going to ask you to put your life on hold for me, Zee.”

  
“You _are_ my life, Kay.”

“Not your _whole_ life.”

“You and skating, and skating isn’t really a thing right now.”

  
“But you’re going to have school.” She reaches for his hand and laces her fingers through his. “And Iroh tells me you’re still practicing.”

“Not a ton.”

“And you have a little sister who needs you.”

“Azula spends every waking hour at the rink this time of year.”

“Still.” She squeezes his hand. “And you have friends who’d probably love to see more of you.”

“Um, I really don’t think they would.”

  
“They _definitely_ would,” she assures him. “And besides, you get my point.”

He drops his chin to her shoulder. “No, I don’t think I do.”

“What I mean is that I’m not going to demand more of your time than I should,” she says. “I mean…I _want_ to, but I can’t. So I have a proposal.”

“Shoot.”

“I don’t want you to spend too much time worrying about me,” she says, “so I have an idea.”

“You’re my girlfriend and you’re having spinal surgery, Kay. I’m not going to _not_ worry about you.”

“Okay, so when you do, I have an idea.” She turns so she can look at him. “If you find yourself worrying about me, pick up a book and call me.”

“Huh?”

“I wasn’t done.” She shakes her head fondly. “Call me and just start reading. Doesn’t matter what the book is, or where you are in it – just call me and read to me. You don’t have to come over or even video-chat. Just…let me hear your voice.”

“Wouldn’t it be better if I came over?” his brows crease worriedly. “I mean, don’t get me wrong, I love that idea, but why can’t I just come do it in person?”

“The point of this is so I can spend time with you without upending your whole life.” Katara shakes her head and takes his face in her hands. “It’s my own fault that this got so bad. I’m not letting you suffer for it.”

“You think that’s _suffering?”_ Zuko’s expression is stricken now. “You think I don’t _want_ to be with you whenever I can?”

“Well…” she glances guiltily into the middle distance. “I mean…”

“Kay…”

“I’m already inconveniencing everyone enough, Zee. My mom’s taking a week off of work, my grandma is flying out even though she _hates_ flying, Sokka has to miss a lot of class to drive me around…I’m not adding you to the list.” She shakes her head. “I love you, and believe me, I’m nowhere near selfless enough not to ask you to spend time with me because I know I’m going to miss seeing you every day, but…I can’t.” She stiffens. “It’s selfish enough of me just to ask for this. I can’t ask anything more.”

“Kay, it’s not selfish to want company.” Zuko drapes his arm across Katara’s waist and she fits herself into the curve of his body behind her, as close as she can get. “This is hard, and we all want to be here for you. And you _know_ that I’d rather be with you than practicing by myself or reading alone in my room like a nerd.”

“You _are_ a nerd, though.”

  
“Gee, thanks.”

“No, it’s cute.”

“Like my sweater vests are ‘cute’?”

“Exactly like your sweater vests.”

“Well, point stands.”

“Okay, but-“

“Have you considered that I’m going to miss you, too?”

“Well, yes, but that doesn’t give me the right to make unreasonable demands on your time.”

“You won’t, Kay.” She feels his sigh as his chest rises and falls behind her. “But I do like the reading idea, so I hope you won’t mind when I show up at your apartment with a book at weird times.”

  
“Are you sure?”

“ _Kay.”_

“All right.”

**

**January 2 nd**

**Caldera General Hospital**

_The patient’s family will be able to wait in the Surgical Waiting Area as the patient undergoes their procedure and Post-Procedure Observation. Though the typical time spent under observation is about 1-2 hours, it is not a cause for alarm if your loved one’s observation time is-_

“Zuko?”

Zuko looks up from the _Visiting Your Loved One After Surgery_ brochure he’s been reading over and over, unable to focus on anything else, since he arrived. (He hardly feels guilty for telling the doctors that he was Katara’s fiancé anymore, which is an improvement.) “Yes?” he asks, then looks up to find Katara’s parents and an older lady he hasn’t met clustered around him.

“Sorry we weren’t here to greet you. My husband needed coffee,” her mother explains, extending her arms for an unsolicited and, frankly, uncomfortable hug. Zuko acquiesces, but he’s a bit unsure what to make of it.

“No problem,” he replies, letting her go as soon as he reasonably can. _I barely know you,_ he wants to protest, but he bites his tongue. “When is she going to be out of surgery? Do you know?”

“Oh, she already is!” Mrs. Nutaraq says brightly. “She’s doing good. They’re just keeping her under observation while she wakes up, then she’ll have to lie down for an hour or so before they discharge her.”

  
“And no one told me?” Zuko can’t help but blurt out.

  
Mrs. Nutaraq – Kya, he remembers – laughs. “You’re so sweet,” she says, taking a seat beside him with her husband on her other side. “How did you even get in here? Don’t you have to be family?”

  
“I told them I was her fiancé,” he says sheepishly. “I’m not, I promise. I just, um…I needed to be here.” He clears his throat. “For her.”

“Oh. All right.” Kya’s eyes sparkle. “Well, I appreciate that, and I’m sure our Katara does too.”

“I wouldn’t be so sure about that.”

Kya raises her eyebrows. “Oh?”

“She actually, uh, told me not to come.”

“Really?” Katara’s father, Hakoda, cuts in. “Why would she do that?”

Zuko shrugs. “She seems convinced that she’s inconveniencing me with all of this, which is ridiculous. I’m her _partner.”_

“And her boyfriend,” Kya adds.

“…and her boyfriend,” Zuko repeats under his breath, cheeks reddening. It’s not as if the Nutaraqs don’t know that, but it’s still awkward to put it so bluntly in front of near-strangers who just so happen to be his girlfriend’s parents. “Yes. Uh, I…I am.”

“We don’t bite, son,” Hakoda teases. “As far as we’ve heard, we have no reason to run you up the flagpole-“

“ _Hakoda,”_ Kya chides.  
  
“-and we’re grateful that she has you right now,” he finishes. “It’s okay. You can admit it.”

“I just did,” he says under his breath. His cheeks sting as if it’s cold, even though it isn’t.

“Hakoda, stop scaring him,” Kya chides again. “Look at him. He’s a nervous wreck.”

“Um, it’s okay,” Zuko cuts in. _This will probably get me in their good graces._ “I know he’s kidding. I’m just…awkward.”

“So Katara has said,” Hakoda replies. “She seems to think it’s endearing.”

“She only tells me that _constantly.” Really?_ That’s _what she told her parents about me?_

“She’s in love. Cut her some slack,” Hakoda says with a knowing smile.

Zuko chokes on nothing. “She said that?”

“She didn’t need to,” Kya says gently. She sounds so much like Katara, saying that, that Zuko has to shake himself so as not to reply as if he’s talking to her and not to her mother. “It was obvious.”

  
“Well.” He fidgets with the hem of his sweater vest. “That’s…that’s…interesting.”

Hakoda’s eyes narrow. “Why, do you not-“

“ _Hakoda!”_

  
“No, no, I, um…” Zuko stammers, beginning to panic as he realizes that he’s either going to have to confess his love to his girlfriend’s parents or set them firmly against him by failing to do so. “I…I’m bad with words, and this is awkward, and-“

“Zuko, it’s all right,” Kya says, setting her hand on his forearm. “You don’t have to do that.”

“But I _do_ love her,” he protests, “and I don’t want you to think that I don’t or…you know.” 

“That was never in question, Zuko.” Kya glares pointedly at her husband. “But it _is_ good to hear.”

  
Zuko is spared the indignity of responding to that when the hallway door swings open and a nurse pokes her head through to the waiting room. “Mr. and Mrs. Nutaraq?” she calls, and the family (plus impostor) follows her down a short hallway to a room marked “Nutaraq, Katara”.

Zuko is the first one through the door, and though Katara isn’t supposed to sit, she crosses her arms.

“I thought I told you not to come,” she says, groggy but entirely aware of her surroundings.

“Did you actually think I was going to listen?”

  
“Not really.”

He crosses to her bedside and leans down to kiss her forehead. “Your parents and I had a nice chat in the waiting room,” he says, taking a seat beside her even though he knows she’s probably going to kick him out post-haste. “And by that I mean they interrogated me until I broke down and admitted that I loved you, which was pretty awkward. Anyways. How are you feeling, sweetheart?”

  
“Don’t call me that.”

“Not great, I take it.”

“How do you _think_ I feel?” she fixes him with her stoniest glare.

His expression shifts to one of sympathy. “I’m sorry.”

He’s pretty sure she isn’t supposed to move, but she reaches for his hand anyways. “Zuko?” she asks, her voice still weak.

“Yeah?”

  
“Thank you.” She doesn’t smile, but he knows she means it. “For being here.”

  
He takes the hand in his to kiss her knuckles, and it’s all the answer she needs.

 **** ****


	14. Roadblocks

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter, like most chapters I write, could give you intense tonal whiplash. Please enjoy at your own risk. 
> 
> Each week label = the week of her 12-week recovery that it takes place in. One can typically walk very soon after having a kyphoplasty, the type of surgery that Katara has, but can’t resume full activity for 12 weeks.

**_WEEK ONE_ **

Kya Nutaraq opens the door to her daughter’s apartment when Zuko knocks, and he’d be lying if he didn’t admit that it scares him a little. He feels like he’s trespassing, standing awkwardly in the doorway with a takeout bag in his hands and a book under his arm – as if Kya’s going to throw him to the curb at any moment for daring to intrude on her daughter. But she hardly seems bothered. “She’s been waiting for you,” Kya says with no preamble, knowing he doesn’t need any further explanation than that.

“Is she okay?” he asks, even though he’ll be able to see for himself soon enough – it’s always best to get a second opinion when it comes to Katara’s health, knowing as well as he does that she’s inclined to exaggerate if she thinks it’ll get her cleared to train sooner. “Like, I know she _says_ she is, but is she _actually_ okay?”

“A little sore, but the doctors said that would go away soon,” Kya replies. “Of course, she’d never admit it, but it’s obvious. She’s up and walking but it’s obvious that she’s not quite back to normal.”

  
“Good to know.” None of that is surprising – the kyphoplasty procedure she’d undergone had been minimally invasive (as she’d explained six hundred times while arguing for a shorter recovery break) – but he knows she’s not going to want to rest no matter how much she needs to, so in its own way, her improved mobility might not be a great thing. He can see without much effort how she might take it as encouragement to push herself too hard. “And is she resting?”

“I’m just glad she has so much schoolwork to catch up on,” Kya admits wearily. “At least it keeps her sitting down.”

“All right.” He nods in Kya’s direction before he turns off into the hallway. “Thanks.”

“No, thank _you,”_ she calls after him. “She’s missed you.”

He doesn’t tell her that he’s pretty sure he’s missed Katara even more. So he’s a little too eager when he knocks softly at her bedroom door, slightly ajar. “Can I come in?” he asks, suddenly shy for no reason at all.

“Zuko?” He hears the sound of rustling fabric and almost opens the door to stop her, but she’s already up and he doesn’t want to barge in if there’s any reason for her not to want him in her room before she permits it, so he stills his hand just above the doorknob. That means, though, that he has to flinch away to avoid being hit when she swings it outwards. “You don’t have to do that.”

“I didn’t want to intrude,” he says, a little peevish at having made her get up and nearly been hit in the span of a minute, but it’s hard to stay like that when he catches a glimpse of the open relief on her face. “But hi.”

Seeing that Zuko is frozen in place, she reaches out to tug his arm. “Are you gonna stand there all day?”

“Sorry, sorry.” He shakes himself, then leans in for a quick greeting kiss. “How are you?”

  
“Pretty good. Bored, though.” She sits back down in a depression in her duvet, covers crushed down where she’s probably spent hours resting against them, then pauses to sniff the air. “Is that teriyaki chicken?”

He nods. “The one from Tomo’s that you like.”

She sinks back against the pillows, her smile spreading across her face with more ease than it has in ages. “What did I do to deserve you?” she laughs, reaching out her hands. “Gimme.”

“Are you sure you want to eat in bed?” he asks warily – he’s always been a stickler about that. “Seems kinda unsanitary.”

  
“Yes,” she says flatly.

“Do you mind if I eat on the floor, then?”

“I’m not letting the love of my life eat on my floor,” Katara says, arching her brows in mock-indignation. “Do you have any idea how long it’s been since I vacuumed in here?”

  
“I’m the love of your life?”

“Uh, you have teriyaki chicken from Tomo’s in your hands. Of course you are.”

“Y’know, I was really hoping it would be something a bit more substantial than the chicken that sealed the deal.”

“There are worse reasons,” Katara says, innocently batting her eyelashes. “Are you _sure_ you want to eat on the floor?"

"I just have a thing about eating on beds, but you’re still recovering and I’m not going to ask you to move, so I thought it would be best if I just…y’know, did my own thing.”

  
Katara regards him thoughtfully for a moment, then stands. Zuko lunges forwards to catch her, but she’s perfectly steady, and she takes a few steps forwards before she sinks to a rugless patch of floor beside her bed, using its frame to support her back, and reaches up her hands.

“Chicken,” she instructs.

“Kay, you shouldn’t-“

  
“Yes, I _should.”_ She pats the ratty carpet beside her. “Sit with me.”

“Are you _sure?”_

“I’m sure, Zuko.”

He _shouldn’t_ give in, but he’s not about to ask her to move again, so he sinks to the floor beside her, back supported by the bedframe the same way hers is. She crosses her legs and reaches over. Zuko fishes around in the takeout bag for a fork, then hands it to her along with a steamed-up plastic bowl of chicken and rice (brown rice, always – Katara says that white rice makes her stomach sick, which strikes Zuko as nothing short of tragic). She opens the lid and breathes in the scent wafting off her food with a contented sigh.

  
“You’re the best, Nishimura,” she sighs, and those are the last words she says for a while. He looks over at her every few moments as he eats – she’s clearly hungry, given the way she scarfs it down, and he realizes with a pang that she probably wouldn’t be allowing herself this indulgence if they were training normally right now. Feeding themselves only what will optimize their performance is something they and every other skater of note has gotten used to, but Katara’s happy sigh when she sets aside her empty bowl and rests her head against Zuko’s shoulder makes him wish he could see her sacrifice a little less and enjoy a little more. 

“I saw you brought a book,” she says after a moment of contented silence.

“I did.”

“Which one?”

“More love poetry.” He turns to her with a lopsided, sheepish smile. “Since you liked my Neruda sonnets so much.”

“You’re such a sap,” she teases gently, fingers wrapping around his forearm in a subtle, permanent sort of way. He flips the book to a page he’s dog-eared and wonders if her fingers will leave a brand where they’ve encircled his wrist; he thinks he’d like them to, a part of her forever imprinted upon his skin. “Is this something you’re reading for class?”

He shakes his head. “No, just something I happen to like.”

“How’s school? You haven’t really said much about it.” She releases his wrist so she can bring her fingers to rest against the small of his back. “Is it going well?”

  
“It’s only the first week, Kay.” He laughs, and kisses her hair because he can and can’t think of a good enough reason not to. “But it’s nice. I’m kinda loading up on credits this semester, but it’s not like I have much else to do, so I’m managing.”

“And are you liking being able to nerd out about books with actual human beings again?”

“Not much nerding-out going on yet, but I’m sure I will.” He opens his arm to her, and she slips beneath it. “I’m mostly in boring GE classes.”

“Math?”

  
“Math,” he sighs.

  
“Poor thing.” Katara pats his shoulder consolingly. “Read to me?”

“Sorry, yeah, got sidetracked.” He clears his throat and opens his book, which has fallen closed, back to the page he left off on.

“You never told me what this was.”

“Oh, right.” He closes it to show her the cover. “Rumi. Another poet who I liked before but now can’t get through in a timely fashion because his work unfailingly manages to remind me of you.”

Katara’s laugh comes out like a cough. “Sometimes you scare me a little.”

“Why, is this too much?”

“No, no, of course not,” she hastily reassures him. “It’s just…crazy to think that I could ever be the kind of girl who…I don’t know, makes someone feel like that.”

He glances down at her, head tilted. “Like what?”

“Well…the way I’ve felt about people I’ve had feelings for, I guess,” she says. “Like every love song is about them, and we were the characters in every movie I saw, and their faces were the ones I’d see when I was performing and I had to act like I loved my partner.” She turns her head to look up at him, feeling appropriately poetic. “I never thought _I_ would be the girl someone thought all the poets were writing about.”

“Well, every artist has his muse,” Zuko replies, his cheeks coloring. He’s rarely so bold. “Maybe you weren’t theirs, but you’re mine, and I guess that means I put you in place of whoever they _were_ writing about.”

“Zuko…”

“It’s just true.” He shrugs. “Anyways. Can I…?”

  
“Of course.”

“Okay.” He nods, opening to the lost page yet again. “This one especially reminds me of you.”

“Mm?” she rests her head on his shoulder.

  
“Yeah.” He clears his throat. “ _I want to see you_ ,” he reads. “ _Know your voice. Recognize you when you first come round the corner. Sense your scent when I come into a room you’ve just left. Know the lift of your heel, the glide of your foot_.” They both smile at that – it’s a little too spot-on – and when he next speaks, his voice is a little raspier than usual. “ _Become familiar with the way you purse your lips then let them part, just the slightest bit, when I lean into your space and kiss you.”_

He pauses, then, his breath catching.

  
“ _I want_ ,” he reads on a deep exhalation, “ _to know the joy of how you whisper ‘more_.’”

Again, Zuko stops, his hand settling at the curve of her waist.

“That’s you,” he says after a moment.

  
“Me?”

“You.”  
  


**_**_ **

****

**_WEEK THREE_ **

****

Katara’s hair is still falling out of its ponytail after physical therapy, and she hasn’t changed out of her exercise clothes. It’s not particularly painful, nor nearly as intense as her usual training, but she’s still a little sore and a little shell-shocked at the way her strength has diminished in the month since her training stopped. And the pain that’s barely there anymore feels suffocating when she can’t resist the urge to pull up a livestream of the National Championships.

She wishes she had an exam to study for, another physical therapy appointment, some real reason not to watch, but she doesn’t and she can’t resist. Sokka’s at hockey practice, her mother and grandmother long-departed; her friends at the rink are busy, her friends at school out doing whatever it is that normal college students do on weekends; she hardly wants to impose on Zuko when he’s already been over three times this week and he’s trying to cram two semesters’ worth of credits into one.

So she really doesn’t have a reason not to, nor anything better to do, than sit in front of her laptop at the kitchen counter, slumped because her back is too sore after physical therapy to sit up straight, in the clothes she slept in and wore to her appointment and hasn’t taken off in at least twenty-four hours.

She should change, she knows, but she doesn’t.

“Now, these are the ones to watch at these championships.” A commentator’s tinny voice through her speaker has Katara blinking at the screen, disoriented, before she settles back into reality. _Watching skating. Right._ The camera zooms in on Iknik Varrick and Zhu Li Moon as they run their fourth set of side- perhaps Katara’s least-favorite teammates. “Varrick and Moon are the three-time, defending national champions…”

Katara doesn’t have the patience for commentators right now, and she tunes out their voices. Her eyes fix glassily on the screen as the last group of pairs teams warm up for their short program, taking it all in but registering nothing as they pass the camera. It’s hard to ignore the growing, gnawing desperation she feels in her gut as three of the four teams on the ice skate off, leaving only a pairs team just out of juniors whose nervous excitement is palpable standing at the boards. They exchange a look of cautious elation, and she realizes that tears have been welling up in her eyes without her knowing it.

  
She’d give _anything_ to be one of those kids right now, sixteen and full of dreams unhindered by wasted years, taking the ice at their first Nationals. She feels the comfortable rigidity of the ice beneath her in her bones, then feels the weight those bones carry now. She’s tried to tell herself that she’s lucky – lucky her injury wasn’t worse, lucky there was such a noninvasive procedure available to treat it, lucky she isn’t in pain, lucky she never has to worry about being dropped again, lucky she’ll be back out on the ice in two months – but it’s not working anymore.

  
She wants to _be_ there tonight, wearing that dress she hates and giving that tango the best of her no matter how strange it still feels. And son long as there is no substitute for the ice under her feet, or her partner’s hand in hers, she will resent every voice, no matter how beloved, telling her to slow down, take her time, listen to her aching bones. Katara is rare, she knows, in her utter conviction of the fact that she is doing what she was born to do; here, unable to do it, she barely knows who or where or _why_ she is.

She knows she should close her laptop, but she doesn’t.

****

**_**_ **

****

**_WEEK SIX_ **

****

It’s strange, not seeing Katara every day, and stranger still that he’s become so used to her presence. A year and a half ago, she was a business partner; now she’s taken up residence in his mind, and takes up almost all of the space there. He wakes and checks his phone for Katara’s messages; he reads a passage he particularly likes in a class reading and his first thought is to send it to her; sunsets and songs and odd trinkets in store windows remind him of her. Even in her relative absence, even when they are not training and their practical need to think of each other is minimal, he thinks very little of anyone else. He cannot even imagine why he would _want_ to.

Zuko never considers the possibility that this might not be entirely normal. He turns his thoughts, instead, to worry: Katara has been more distant in the past few days than she has been in the whole of their year and six weeks together, and though he knows she has a lot to work through, he’s not sure why. After all, when she says she wants to be alone, she almost always means that she doesn’t want to inconvenience him – why, then, does she still wall herself off when he’s told her there’s nothing too important to put on hold for her?

And so he finds himself staringly blankly at his laptop screen, eyes fixed on the point where his mouse blinks in and out of view against the reading he’s supposed to be doing for his economics class, thinking of anything but his schoolwork.

A few moments of this proves too much for him, though, and though he always leaves his phone at least halfway across the room when he’s trying to study, he reaches for it. He’s told himself to give her space, but for all he knows, space might be the last thing she actually needs right now, and he needs to know if she’s all right. She’s every single one of his last six calls (the seventh was Iroh, asking if he needed anything from the grocery store, which just about sums up the extent of Zuko’s social life at the moment), so it barely takes a second to call.

She picks up after the third ring. “Zuko?”

  
“Hi, Katara.” His throat feels dry. “I’m just checking in.”

He hears her let out a breath through the speaker. “I’m okay, thanks.”

“You sure?”

  
“Yes, I’m _sure.”_ She sounds a little annoyed. “Why, did you think I wouldn’t be?”

  
“I just…don’t know how you’re holding up. Sorry if you wanted to be alone.”

“Thanks, but when I tell you I need space, I mean it.”

“But sometimes-“

“Yes, sometimes I _do_ change my mind, but don’t I always _tell_ you that?”

“Well…yeah.”

“Look, Zuko, you’ve been really good about all of this, but you have to understand that sometimes I really do need to be alone.”

“Are you _sure?”_

“Will you stop asking me that?” her voice pitches up in agitation. “Yes, Zuko, I _am_ sure that I need some space. I’m in pain and I haven’t slept and the last thing I want to do is look at you and be reminded that we’re supposed to be _partners_ and I’m the reason we aren’t-“

“We _are_ partners, Kay.”

“Please don’t call me that right now.” Her breath catches. _“Please_ don’t.”

“Katara, you’re clearly not fine. I’m not just going to ignore that.”

“I might not be, but that’s only going to get worse if I have to spend every waking second with a living, breathing reminder that I can’t train, so _please_ just leave me alone, Zuko.” He can hear her breathing hard through his phone. “I need you to leave me alone.”

“Okay,” he says, even though he feels like he’s been kicked in the chest by a horse.

She hangs up before he has a chance to say goodbye.

****

**_**_ **

****

**_WEEK SEVEN_ **

****

“It’s not your fault, Katara. It’s really not.” Suki reaches for Katara’s hands, both balled into fists in the fabric of her quilt. “All couples fight and you don’t have to feel bad-“

“But that’s just the _thing!”_ Katara frees one of her hands to grab a tissue from the depleted supply in the box on her nightstand. “Yeah, but…” she stops to blow her nose. “Zuko and I have never fought like _this,_ and….and…”

“Well, it was bound to happen eventually,” Suki says gently. “I mean, just last week I told Sokka that-“

“Please do me a favor and don’t finish that sentence,” Katara sniffles.

“Fair enough.” Suki squeezes her hands. “The point is, it’s awful in the moment, but you can’t freak out just because it hit you that this relationship isn’t personal-best scores and sappy poetry all the time.”

“It’s not _sappy.”_

“It’s _extremely_ sappy.”

“It’s not sappy if he _means_ it.”

Suki takes a breath, then tries again. “I think,” she says carefully, “that what I’m trying to say is that you can’t be scared that it’s the end as soon as the rush starts to wear off, you know?”

“What rush?”

“Katara, even you can’t deny that you guys are in the honeymoon phase.”

“Well, yeah, but I _like_ it.”

“Everyone likes the honeymoon phase. I mean, I know I do,” she says with a smile that she can’t quite conceal. “But it’s so temporary. That thing that gets you through the hard days - that makes you call back when only a few hours ago, you wanted to lock yourself in because he’s so unbearably clingy? _That’s_ what’s going to last.”

“He probably _hates_ me,” she sobs, post-breakup-teenager inconsolable. “He’s the clingiest guy _ever_ and I told him to leave me alone!”

“Katara, honey, that’s…not a bad thing.” Katara finally looks up and Suki has to restrain herself from wincing at the puffiness of her eyes. “I mean, he needs to remember that you’re not the only person in his life, right?”

“Well, yeah.” Katara picks at a frayed thread in her quilt. “But I feel so _bad.”_

“He’s gonna be okay, Katara. Seriously.” Suki smiles as if she’s speaking from a place of far more experience than she, whose first relationship is barely older than Katara’s, actually has. “And if you really feel like it, you can just give him an extra-long hug when you next see him, okay?”

Katara begins to cry at some unidentifiable provocation.

“Did I say something?”

“He’s so _stupid,”_ Katara sobs. “I get all mad at him for no reason and he’s probably gonna trip over himself _apologizing_ when I see him next and…and…”

“Breathe, Katara.”

“I love him so much.” She manages to laugh, at least, through her tears. “He’s so stupid, and this whole fight is so stupid, and I’m being stupid, and he’s so _stupidly_ clingy, but I love him _so much,_ Suki. And I _know_ it’s good that I’m…setting boundaries or whatever, but I _miss_ him, and…” she stops to breathe. “Now he’s ignoring my calls.”

“Because you yelled at him to give you space?”

“No, because he’s _mad.”_

“You two aren’t _that_ far out of the honeymoon phase.” Suki shakes her head fondly and her thumbs brush the backs of Katara’s hands comfortingly. “He’ll probably brood for a while-“

“He’ll _definitely_ brood for a while.”

“Is this the part where you jump in with some comment about how sexy it is when he broods?”

Katara whacks her friend with a pillow. “I said that _once,_ and it was a _joke!”_

“-but then he’ll quit sexy-brooding-“

“I hate you.”

“And start trying to make things right,” Suki finishes, laughing in earnest now. “Probably by standing outside your door in a rainstorm, if I know him at all.”

“He _would.”_

  
“Exactly.” Suki releases Katara’s hands with one last squeeze. “I know it sucks, but fighting isn’t that earth-shattering. It just…happens.”

Katara leans back against her palms and lets out a heavy sigh. “I know, but I also _don’t.”_

“Part of you is still mad and the rest misses him like crazy?” Suki guesses.

“That exactly.”

“Well, if it’s any consolation, you definitely did the right thing,” Suki reassures her. “I mean, he’s been super sweet and all, but your worlds don’t revolve around each other.”

“I feel like I could’ve been nicer about it, though.”

“Maybe, but what can you do? What’s done is done.”

“Gee, thanks. Real encouraging.”

  
“The point is that at least this fight accomplished something,” she explains. “I mean, he knows now that you actually mean it when you say you need space, right?”

Katara shrugs weakly. “I guess.” 

“And that’s a good step.”

“Did we _need_ it, though?”

“Well, considering that he was banging on your door at all hours of the night, worrying about you, I’m pretty sure that any sign he gets that maybe he needs to back off a little is a good one.”

“But I don’t _want_ him to back off,” Katara protests. “He’s the only thing getting me through this…” she pauses. “…recovery. Thing.”

“Um, _hello?”_

“Not the _only_ thing,” Katara amends.

“No one’s saying you have to go cold-turkey, Katara. Just…maybe that it’s a good time to start…transitioning to a less Zuko-centric lifestyle.”

“You sound like a bad self-help book.”  
  


Suki tosses her hair, though most of it ends up in her face. “It’s what I do.” Katara laughs halfheartedly, which she counts as a win. “But seriously, this isn’t the end of the world. It hurts, yeah, but it won’t forever, right?”

“Well, I certainly hope not.”

“Besides, I’m pretty sure he’s gonna be outside your window with a boom box in about an hour.”

“Who even _owns_ those nowadays?”

“If anyone would, it would be Iroh, and if anyone would try to talk Zuko into trying something ridiculous like that-“

“It would also be Iroh,” Katara finishes.  
  
“Yup.” Suki shakes her head fondly. “Trust me, he’s not going to stay mad for very long, if he even was to begin with.”

“You sure about that?”

“Positive.”

****

**_**_ **

****

**_WEEK NINE_ **

****

“You look like a federal disaster area.”

  
“Well, hello to you, too…”

Azula rolls her eyes and opens the door just far enough to allow her brother to enter, but not an inch further. “If this is about Katara, count me out. Your brooding is bad for my productivity.”

“I don’t _brood.”_

“Please, Zuko. Brooding is your favorite hobby.”

“Seriously?”

She stops and turns back to him as if she’s sizing him up. He can’t say why, but it’s making him nervous.

“You need to be talking to Ty Lee, not me.”

“Um…no.”

“What? I thought you liked Ty Lee.”

“Doesn’t mean I want her girlfriend advice.”

  
“Ah, so you admit that it’s Katara.”

“Is it ever anything else?”

“Well, that one time it was a hernia,” she points out.

“I think she’d resent being compared to a pulled muscle.”

  
“Well, she probably also resents _you_ -“

“That was three weeks ago and it’s resolved, Azula.”

“Doesn’t seem resolved to me.” They finally reach the end of the hallway and Azula takes a seat in one of the living room’s armchairs. The furniture in the house she and her training mates have been renting since Ty Lee’s father, sick of her complaints about the quality of her accommodations, decided to bankroll it is far nicer than anything at home, so Zuko is all too happy to follow her lead. “But I’ll take your word for it. What is it now?”

“Can’t it just be that I wanted to see my sister?”

  
“Well, it could, but you don’t really expect me to believe that, do you?”  
  
“Ouch.”

“What? You usually don’t associate with anyone besides Uncle or Katara if you don’t need something.”

“Again, _ouch.”_ He shakes his head. “I ask you how you’re doing all the time!”

“Out of obligation,” she says coolly.

  
“Um, _no.”_

“Would you let it go if I told you I was messing with you?” Azula picks at her acrylics disinterestedly. “Really, it doesn’t bother me.”

“What if I don’t _want_ to be a hermit who only talks to his girlfriend?”

Azula looks up at him, sculpted brows perfectly-arched. (He wonders sometimes if she tells the ladies who thread her eyebrows to shape them so that they’ll look optimally skeptical when she raises them – he wouldn’t be even slightly surprised if she did.) “Well, that would be news to me.”

“ _Azula.”_

“What? I’m just providing my honest assessment of your behavior.”

“And what if I happen to resent that assessment?”

“Well, that would be a you problem, wouldn’t it?”

“…she told me that I needed to have friends besides her,” Zuko admits.

“Ah, and there we have it.” Azula shakes her head. “I knew you didn’t come here without an ulterior motive.”

“Well, just because I needed a reminder doesn’t mean-“

“Yes, I think it does.” Azula shifts, uncrossing her legs and then recrossing them in the opposite arrangement – left over right to right over left. “But I’m willing to indulge your paltry attempts at character development, so have at it.”

“Um. Thanks?”

“One may never say I am not merciful.”

“Actually, that’s probably one of the first things one _would_ say about you, but I’m gonna let that slide.” Zuko leans back, sinking into the plush leather of the armchair and wishing for the eighth time in so many seconds that Ty Lee lived with _him_ so that her filthy-rich father would furnish Uncle Iroh’s somewhat shabbier living room in such luxury. “But that’s neither here nor there.”

“You sound like my seventy-year-old British neighbor,” Azula points out. “Oh, A _zu_ lahr, how _do_ you do? I’m _foine,_ but that’s neither _heayh_ nor _thayh!_ ”

Zuko stares blankly at his sister for a moment before bursting out laughing, not entirely of his own volition. Azula glares at him, but he doesn’t miss the tiny glint of satisfaction in her eyes at having made her perpetually-morose brother laugh so uncontrollably.

“I think,” he wheezes, “that I’ve _finally_ found something you’re not good at.”

“What, impressions?”

“Accents,” Zuko says when his laughter has subsided enough to let him speak. “That was _awful.”_

“I know.” Azula starts to pick at her nails again – he wonders if that’s a nervous habit of hers, why he’s never noticed it before if it is. “But I’ve found that one can get away with doing all manner of things badly if one only pretends to believe that one is good at them.”

“And now you’re talking like a Jane Austen protagonist.” Zuko crosses his arms and regards her suspiciously. “Are you _sure_ you’re okay?”

“No more or less so than you,” she says primly. “Anyways. How is your partner holding up?”

“Doing well, I think, but she’s still not very happy with me.”

“Because you’re unbearably clingy?” Azula guesses.

“She thinks that it’s unhealthy for us to only spend time with each other,” he says, adopting his favorite sulking position. “And I think she’s still kinda mad at me.”

“As she should be.”

“Really, Zuli?”

“I mean, you can be incredibly bull-headed.” Azula raises her hands in surrender, a gesture which Zuko knows she doesn’t really mean. “I can’t blame her.”

“Gee, _thanks.”_

“I mean, I know _I’d_ be mad if I couldn’t skate, and I’d be madder if I had a clingy boyfriend breathing down my neck all the time.”

“I’m trying to _support_ her.”

“Which sometimes means backing off, Zuzu.”

“Don’t call me that.”

“Don’t call me Zuli, then,” she counters.

“You’re getting ready for Four Continents, right?” he asks, because this subject clearly isn’t going anywhere.

“Mmhm, but don’t mention it around Mai.” Azula lowers her voice. “She doesn’t like being reminded that they threw her the bone.”

  
“That they what?”

“Threw her the bone?” Azula throws a glance over her shoulder. “You know, because she was fourth at Nationals?”

  
“Oh, right.” Zuko can’t remember much from Japanese Nationals this year, given that Katara had only just found out she’d need surgery when they were held, but he does remember that, now that she mentions it. She’d been assigned to Four Continents because she hadn’t been one of the three skaters selected for the World Championships team. “Too bad, I guess?”

“She _has_ been sulking lately. Maybe you should talk to her?” Azula shrugs. “Sulk together?”

“I’m pretty sure Katara wasn’t talking about my _ex_ when she told me to talk to more people.”

“I doubt she’d care.”

“Maybe not, but _I_ would.”  
  
Azula winces. “That bad?”

“It’s still pretty tense, yeah.”

“Well, I still maintain that-“

“I am _not_ letting Ty Lee try to read my aura.”

  
“Yeah, fair enough.” Azula tucks her legs beneath her, settling in for what he can tell is going to be a lengthy anecdote. “But that reminds me. Did I ever tell you what happened at the Grand Prix Final gala?”

**

**_WEEK TWELVE_ **

****

She takes his hand, and he is grateful for it.

“Nervous?” Zuko asks, tracing the line of her thumb with his own against the artificial chill.

“A little,” Katara admits. “But mostly relieved.”

He takes her other hand in his and turns her to face him. “Look, I want you to know that I know this has been hard for you, and I’m sorry I’ve made it harder-“

“Zuko.”

“Yes?”

She pushes herself up onto her toepicks, just enough to kiss his forehead.

“Shut up,” she says, falling back to the flats of her blades and pressing her forehead against his.

  
“But-“

“It’s been three months and I can _finally_ skate again,” she says, pressing a finger to his lips. “So could you just enjoy it with me instead of apologizing so much?”

He pauses to consider. “All right.”

  
She turns back to him as she steps onto the ice with the megawatt smile he hasn’t seen in months, and grabs his hand. _Come on!,_ she urges wordlessly, and he follows.

After all, they’ve come too far to turn back now.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ngl that "every artist has his muse" section kinda makes me want to throw up in hindsight but THAT'S OKAY. I AM POSTING THINGS I KNOW ARE BAD AND THAT IS CHARACTER DEVELOPMENT.


	15. Exclusive

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here, have your obligatory annual Fire Nation Girls Chapter, and be glad I didn't give Ty Lee a Crash Landing On You OST program because ~I felt like it.~

**_En Route to Four Continents Figure Skating Championships_ **

**_Taipei, Taiwan_ **

****

“Are you reading hate tweets about yourself again?”

“They’re not _hate tweets.”_ Ty Lee turns, hunching over her phone to shield it from her roommate’s curiosity.

_Ty Lee Park had such potential but I’m afraid she might be a bit over the hill,_ she reads. IceForum, an internet message board for figure skating fans, is a goldmine of such posts; she doesn’t like to admit how often she goes looking for them. This one’s from a poster named NishimuraDevotee. _When it comes to raw talent, she’s near the top, but she hasn’t been handling that growth spurt well…idk, I’m a little worried about her future in the sport ::shrug::._

“Ty _Lee,”_ Mai sighs.

_It’s not like this doesn’t happen to all of the baby Russians too, but I was really hoping that Ty Lee would be able to evade it ::sad2::. She had something so special – maybe she still does, but I can’t really tell what’s up with her between the meltdowns and the videos she constantly posts of herself landing jumps she hasn’t hit in a single competition this season. Like, is she trying to convince herself that she’s still got it?_

Mai nudges Ty Lee’s shoulder until she forces it to open up, allowing her to read what’s on the screen. Rolling her eyes, she scrolls up to the top of the page in spite of a yelp of protest (half the plane turns to stare) from Ty Lee, and reads the title of the thread of posts. “’Can Ty Lee Park come back from this season?’” she reads. “You’re seriously reading _this?”_

Ty Lee snatches her phone back, pressing it protectively to her chest, and turns her most wounded look on Mai. She doesn’t say anything, but she doesn’t need to – Ty Lee doesn’t really understand the concept of a poker face, and her face is too expressive to hide what she’s thinking most of the time. She’s hurt, that much is obvious, but she can’t seem to stop herself from reading. Mai suspects that the IceForum thread isn’t the only internet source she’s been turning to lately.

  
“You’re not doing anyone any good by purposely reading posts about how you’re ‘over the hill,’” she says archly. “I mean, go ahead if you want, but why bother?”

  
Ty Lee picks at the hem of the black skirt she’d chosen to wear on the flight, because she believes that if she begins to wear sweatpants in public (as Mai has for this flight), she will lose her will to live. “You wouldn’t get it.”

“People have been calling me Azula and Suki’s second-rate backup for years,” Mai huffs. “Believe me, I _get_ it.”

“Being the fan favorite was always kind of my thing,” Ty Lee confesses. She isn’t making eye contact, but Mai watches her downcast eyes anyway. “It wasn’t scores that kept me going, ‘cause I almost never got the scores I thought I deserved anyways. It was kids in Instagram who made little video edits of my programs, and everyone swarming me for autographs, and people who’d never even watched skating finding out who I was because videos of my spins” – her flexibility is legendary – “were all over the internet. _That’s_ what made it all worth it.” She swallows hard. “And I’m scared that I’m losing it, and if I am, I have to _know.”_  
  
“You’re just hurting yourself by constantly putting this information into your brain.” Mai crosses her arms. “You _should_ be focusing on what you can do to improve, not the reasons that people think you can’t.”

“Why do you even care?” Ty Lee says sullenly, turning back to her phone. Mai reaches over and plucks the phone from her hand before she can find new reading material even more upsetting than the IceForum thread.

“Because you’re being an idiot and you’re going to throw your career out the window for no reason,” she says coolly. _And because I hate seeing you like this,_ she doesn’t tell her. “It would be pretty stupid of you to throw away a career that’s just getting started because some people on the internet thought you were…whatever they think you are.” She doesn’t want to say ‘over the hill’ again, not when Ty Lee had winced like she’d been slapped the last time. “So quit it.”

“Give me my phone back.”

“Not until you promise me to stop being stupid.” Mai turns to glare at her. “If you need something to read, download a book or whatever. Just not _that.”_

Ty Lee sighs and folds her arms across her chest. Mai’s pretty sure she’s not getting her promise, but at least she’s got her thinking about it.

“I just think it’s good to be informed,” she says crossly.

“Informed or so hyperaware of every negative thing that people are saying about you that you start to believe every word of it without question?” Mai asks. “Informed, or convinced that you’ll never skate a clean program because people on the internet who only seen the highlight reel took a few bad competitions to mean that you’re done for?”

“No one comes back from growth spurts,” Ty Lee says, suddenly more fragile than defensive. “I mean, there’s a reason the Russian team is on a conveyer belt.”

  
It’s hard to deny that that’s true: the secret behind the Russian girls’ success is, essentially, a jump technique which relies on the kind of aerodynamics that only a prepubescent body can provide. There are dozens of girls who could easily compete with the best in the world waiting in the wings; when puberty makes it impossible for one girl to maintain that technique which allows for such freakish consistency, another rises to take her place. So long as a skater is replaceable, the system can be sustained. And, though that depth of talent exists only in Russia and, to a lesser extent, Japan, skaters everywhere struggle when they hit growth spurts. Few skaters manage to regain the jump technique they had before their bodies developed.

  
And Ty Lee’s shot up three inches this year. That, too, is impossible to deny.

“Maybe,” Mai says, though she’s never really doubted that this is a mere bump in the road for Ty Lee. (Her own mediocrity, she’s afraid, is a little more permanent.) “But if anyone were to do it, it wouldn’t be by reading about how she couldn’t.”

**

**_Short Program_ **

**_Four Continents Figure Skating Championships_ **

**_Taipei, Taiwan_ **

It is a truth universally acknowledged, at least among Japanese figure skaters, that Four Continents is the “honorable mention” of international competitions.

Oh, there’s a little bit of prestige which comes with attending an ISU championship, even the least-important. But, oftentimes, big federations will send their third-or-fourth-place skater, the one who didn’t place well enough at Nationals to qualify for the World Championships, to Four Continents to allow the bigger names to rest before Worlds, or to throw skaters who were almost good enough a bone. It’s where one sends the skaters one can’t help but acknowledge but doesn’t really want to reward.

Mai knows this truth well – this is her fifth consecutive year at Four Continents (the first, when she was fifteen, had felt like the chance of a lifetime, and she almost regrets that she’s far too cynical now to remember that excitement with anything but disgust). But this assignment has never felt quite so patronizing as it does this year, because she’d always been _just_ good enough to make Worlds, too, in the previous years that she’d attended. For two years, she and Suki were always neck-and-neck for the national title; then Azula moved up to the senior level at fifteen, and Mai was relegated to a permanent third place, but that was good enough. Japan is always able to send three skaters to Worlds, at least in the ladies’ division. But now she’s lost that tenuous position to a girl a year younger than her who, even though she’s already 19 and far older than most girls who make sudden, meteoric rises in the sport (those usually happen well before the age of 18), is taking the world by storm or one of those overdramatic idioms reporters are so fond of. And in that light, her assignment to Four Continents feels like a slap in the face.

_You weren’t quite good enough,_ it seems to say, _but you deserve_ something _for your trouble._

A part of her hates how badly she wants to succeed here, then. Getting out of Azula’s shadow has always been out of the question, and even Suki is leagues above her now after her bronze medal at last year’s Worlds and all the confidence that’s come with it. But some part of her that she wishes she could ignore still wants to prove something – even though she doesn’t know what, or to whom. To the Federation, that she’s justified in resenting the way they’ve never liked her no matter how much she improves, how consistently she performs? To the girl who’d snagged the bronze medal at Nationals, that she isn’t safe? To Ty Lee, that neither of them ever has to listen to people who loudly insist that either of them is a washout? It could be any of them. It could even be herself to whom she has to prove that she still knows how to do this. Either way, the feeling leaves her feeling strangely hungry. She feels it in practice, watching her competitors reel off jumps almost without effort; she feels it when she sees them chattering away in the hotel lobby, one little group playing cards while another laughs uproariously at a joke that Korra Ayuluk (who’s laughing hardest of all) made.

She feels it most strongly, though, when she steps onto the ice for her short program.

One of the most frequent criticisms of Mai’s skating (because even she can’t resist turning to Twitter sometimes) is that it has an oddly robotic quality, as if she’s reciting words from memory without knowledge of their meaning. Sometimes that helps, though, even if she knows it’s the reason she’s never really been able to break out. She can be a solid technician because she’s trained her body to do what it has to and can be reliably sure that it won’t fail her when it counts. Mai knows what a triple loop is supposed to feel like, and it may be a beat off the music, but it’s solid and landed and fully-rotated – all of her jumps are. She won’t claim that there’s any of the _je ne sais quois_ that makes other skaters stand out while she stays in the shadows in that approach but maybe, she thinks with a bitter sense of satisfaction, the anger roiling in her gut will take care of that. _Danse Macabre_ isn’t a smile-and-point-your-toes piece of music, anyway – maybe it’ll serve her well, this resentful desperation not to let herself be let down yet again. 

Spite has always seemed such an immature motivation to her. After all, she’s spent years privately scoffing at Azula for the lengths to which she’ll go to spite her father – better to act out of pure self-interest than spite if passion or altruism (both of which she’s long since stopped believing in) aren’t possible. But spite is all she feels now, wishing she’d been born with talent, wishing that over a decade of backbreaking work had meant something, wishing she could somehow change the minds of people who are starting to lose faith in her not because of anything within her control but because others simply deserve it more. When she watches the replays of her short program after the fact, she’ll see a chunk of ice the size of her palm go flying when she taps in for the first jump in her triple flip-triple toe loop combination because she slams her toepick into the ice with such force.

_I am not to be written off,_ her blankly displeased expression and tense, alert posture seem to say. She carves her anger into the ice with every turn in her step sequence, kicking up a fine, icy powder that each movement scatters further across the cie. She is skating in the second-to-last group and the ice won’t be resurfaced again before the final skater performs, so the ice will still bear the marks she’s carved across it when each of her competitors takes the ice – a warning, if she’s not going to be sentimental about it.

A warning that her scores – the best all season – reflect.

**

**_Between Programs_ **

**_Four Continents Figure Skating Championships_ **

**_Taipei, Taiwan_ **

“Miss Nishimura!”

It’s always _something_ at these competitions _–_ the only thing that ever changes is the form of address, depending upon the country she’s in. Otherwise, it’s always the same: reigning World Champion Azula Nishimura rarely, if ever, gets her wish when it comes to being left alone. Now, she’s in the lobby, and a young woman whose accent in English (probably their only common language) sounds like that of the locals approaches the deserted couch where she’s been sitting since the rest of the skaters who’d been congregating there abandoned it. She can’t be much older than Azula, and she’s not wearing the badges that characterize official members of the press.

That immediately gets Azula’s attention.

“Hello?” she asks, arching an eyebrow. Normally she’d pretend not to have heard the girl, but this is intriguing, the suddenness and the unofficialness of her approach. She’s more willing to give her a shot than she would usually be.

“Miss Nishimura, it’s an honor,” the girl replies, visibly forcing herself not to blush. “I can’t tell you enough how grateful I am to get a chance to-“

“Spit it out,” Azula says flatly. The girl’s face falls, which barely registers. “What is it?”

“I…I don’t want to bother you,” she stammers. “I’m sorry. I’ll leave you alone.”

“No, it isn’t that,” Azula says. She really hadn’t meant to drive the girl off, even though her simpering isn’t Azula’s favorite. “I just know that you want something. Everyone who approaches me does.”

“If you’re sure it isn’t an inconvenience,” the girl says reluctantly.

  
“Believe me, I wouldn’t be talking to you if it was,” Azula reassures her, though there’s little reassurance in her tone. She gestures to the seat next to her. She’s not sure why she’s even bothering with this girl when there’s obviously nothing to be gained from this conversation, but it’s been so long since anyone outside of a tiny circle of trusted associates approached her so spontaneously that she can’t bring herself to turn her away. “Now, what is it that you want?”

“I’m so sorry, Miss Nishimura, I really don’t want anything-“

“Yes, you do.”

“Just to be able to say that I met my childhood heroine,” she admits sheepishly.

Azula looks her up and down. “You don’t look like you could possibly be much younger than me,” she assesses. “How’d that work?”

“I’m actually older,” she admits. “By a year.”

“Eighteen?”

“Mmhm.” The girl nods. “I’m eighteen. First-year in uni.”

“Well, I’m not easily flattered, but I do have to admit that I find that rather flattering,” Azula says. “Do you skate?”

“I used to. I was never too good at it, but you were always my favorite.” She blushes, twisting a lock of hair around her finger. “I mean, once I got really invested in skating. When I was, like, thirteen. So, sorta childhood, I guess? But maybe not that much?” she looks like she wants to melt through the floor.

Azula knows she should thank her, but she’s caught so off-guard by the girl’s earnestness that she doesn’t even know how to respond. “Well, then. I must have been pretty young when you started watching me.”

“Twelve,” the girl admits, her cheeks coloring. “Japanese Junior Nationals in 2013. That was the first time I watched you skate.”

“Well. I should hope I’ve improved since then.”

“Oh, of course!” the girl says, brightening at what seems to be reception of her praise. “And, um, anyway. I just wanted to say how much I admire you, and, um, I was wondering if…um,” she trails off.

“Ah, so you do have an ulterior motive.” Azula crosses her legs at the knee and folds her hands in her lap primly. She’s enjoying this a little too much when so much of the endless praise she hears is hopelessly superficial. “Which is…?”

“I…have you heard of In the Loop?”

Azula raises an eyebrow – _everyone_ knows what In the Loop is. Figure skating blogs are a dime a dozen online, but that particular one has been around for three years and built up a huge following in that time. It’s a comprehensive review of the goings-on of the skating world, written by an anonymous author or authors – no one really knows -who are as sassy as they are knowledgeable. It’s almost an honor to be on the receiving end of the In the Loop’s cutting wit, but they’ve always loved Azula, so she wouldn’t know. And she begins to put the pieces together.

  
“Don’t tell me you’re the writer,” she says, almost impressed.

The girl nods. “My name is Chen Xinyi, but…none of my readers know that.”

Azula bites back a smile. She’d been pleased enough at Xinyi’s honest praise, but she’s even more flattered knowing that it comes from someone who knows her stuff, someone with valid opinions which most of the figure skating community listens to. “Well, one of them does.”

“Wait, you-“

“Please. _Everyone_ reads In The Loop.” She smiles in earnest now. “You had good things to say about the changes to my free skate at the Grand Prix Final.”

Xinyi nods gravely. “Changing that transition into the second triple flip was smart.”

“And let me guess.” Azula shifts, leaning her weight against the couch’s left armrest. “You want an exclusive?”

Xinyi smiles sheepishly. “Well, I saw the opportunity,” she admits.

“Ah, so you’re not as guileless as you seem.” Azula nods, her face impassive. “I can respect that.”

“Is…that a yes?”

“If you’re asking my permission to write up the most scandalous tell-all interview you possibly can, then yes.” Azula gives her another curt nod, this one accompanied by a small smile. “That is a yes.”

**

“Are you _insane_?”

Azula winces as Zuko’s voice rises on the other end of the phone call. Even across thousands of miles, it’s obvious that he’s not as pleased with the result of In The Loop’s interview of her as she was.

“Maybe I am,” she says coolly.

“Dad is going to be furious! What were you thinking?”

“That when a girl approaches you in the hotel lobby and thoroughly butters you up before telling you she’s the anonymous head writer of In The Loop and gives you a chance to throw some well-concealed punches at your insane father in the process, you don’t turn it down,” Azula replies. “I mean, she’s got a gift for journalism, and I trusted her not to mess it up.”

“Are you hot for this girl or something? Because _nothing_ you’re saying right now sounds like you.”

“I’m tired of picture-perfect and she seemed genuine.” She doesn’t offer any explanation beyond that. “I know you’d think I’d be immune to that sort of thing, but I was intrigued, and I’m _exhausted._ It was good publicity, a chance to be honest about how much being at the top sucks sometimes, and a good break for that girl.”

“Whoever writes In The Loop doesn’t even _need_ a big break. I mean, name a skater who doesn’t already read her blog.” Zuko pauses for a moment, then adds, “I’ll wait.”

“Still. A spontaneous exclusive interview with the World Champion? That never happens. It’s exciting. Gets hits.”

“You realize that Dad is going to see this, right?”

“Oh, I’m positive. Why do you think I was so provocative?”

“It really might not serve you well to be on his bad side,” Zuko points out.

“I’ve weathered worse,” she sighs into the phone. “And besides, is it not a great interview.”

“…I guess.”

  
“It absolutely was.”

“It was pretty good,” Zuko reluctantly admits.

**

**_Free Skate_ **

**_Four Continents Figure Skating Championships_ **

**_Taipei, Taiwan_ **

_Like clockwork._ Ty Lee adjusts the red fabric of her skirt so it hangs right over the tops of her thighs, then shifts her weight to get her feet adjusted to the tightness of her skates, never the same twice, and tries to remember the words. But they don’t do much good when the first chords of her music begin and she remembers why they never have before.

Ty Lee’s had a running joke with Mai for years about their respective approaches to skating: hers, sensitive and artistic and winsome, doesn’t lend itself to consistency the way Mai’s cold, clinical autopilot approach does. She’s often joked that she wishes they could swap for a day just so she might know what it felt like to be able to step onto the ice without fear that any jump might go sideways, and Mai always says the same thing in reply: “it’s like clockwork.” As if that’s all there is to it – as if skating is a soulless thing, something to be manipulated, a matter of physics (it’s really no wonder that Mai chose that major when she began attending college three years ago).

  
It isn’t. Clocks don’t have hearts that race when their names are called. Clocks can’t admire the way the fabric of a skirt fans out with every turn, or remember how many people are watching them. They can’t give any heed to the criticisms of parents and teammates who think that choosing music from their favorite TV drama (even if it _Love Exclusive_ isthe absolute epitome of romance – Ty Lee’s mind won’t be changed) is tacky and pedestrian. Mai can afford that clocklike precision because no one expects anything else from her anymore: consistently clean programs are all anyone ever desires of her. Ty Lee has very little working in her favor besides flexibility and a dancerlike grace if she lets herself lose the soul of her skating. Consistency’s not like clockwork at all – or at least it can’t be for her. She knows that her jumps are squirrely on a bad day, that her brain can’t be trusted no matter how many things she’s tried to toughen it up, because she was born with neither Mai’s indifference nor Azula’s prodigious mental toughness. So get rid of the heart and soul of her skating, and it’s three sad, pathetic minutes punctuated by the loveliest spins in the field.

She can’t afford that.

(After all, longing looks are a hallmark of _Love Exclusive_ ; she _must_ make sure not to let them slip. She likes imagining her favorite scenes as she skates, because it helps to set the tone and keep up that winning winsomeness people have come to expect of her.)

No; so long as she can’t rely on any sort of autopilot, every competition is a crapshoot, and this one is no exception. When she sets up for her opening triple lutz-triple toe loop, she has no idea if she’ll make it back to her feet like she’s supposed to, and she’s pleasantly surprised when she does. Most skaters would be encouraged by that, but Ty Lee knows better. Every jump is its own; it has nothing whatsoever to do with her belief in herself. What matters is whether she’s calm and centered enough to set up for her jumps properly, which is entirely dependent on how much she’s thinking about it – she tends to have much more success when she isn’t. But if she thinks about not thinking about her setups, which are ingrained in her muscle memory and have been for almost a decade now, she’ll almost surely do exactly the opposite of what she should, so it’s best to force herself to think about something else. That, though results in a lack of focus…

It’s a vicious cycle, this delicate balance of overthinking and distraction, and it’s how she knows that it isn’t nervousness which causes her to slip up. The mental toughness she lacks isn’t courage – it’s calmness. Calmness she’s currently trying to force herself to feel, three miraculously-successful jumps into a program she’d been expecting to tank despite her unusually-decent short program, by imagining the scene during which the song she’s currently listening to plays.

(It’s very intense. Chaerin, a show-biz dropout who’s been searching for purpose after cracking under the pressure of the daily grind, is singing karaoke in a noraebang which inexplicably has a wall of windows. It’s a very soulful ballad and she’s singing hear heart out, not realizing that the hero – her costar in the film production she dropped out of – has recognized her voice and stopped to watch her through that very convenient windowpane. She looks up and sees him-

_Ty Lee._

_  
Focus._

She imagines the look on Chaerin’s face when Taewoo meets her eyes and hopes she’s recreating it properly-

_Ty Lee. You have a triple flip in about two seconds._

She sighs into the transition before the jump, and the screen in her mind flickers off.)

It’s a bit unorthodox, but that distraction tactic cheers her (she really does love _Love Exclusive)_ enough to keep her from the panic that’s so often proven fatal to her jumps as she sets up for the fifth of her seven jumps. She can hardly believe that she’s five jumps and a spin in without a mistake, but she’s not about to look a gift horse in the mouth.

But that’s a bit of a moot point when her brain is already rejoicing: _could this be it? Am I actually skating a clean program?_

It is precisely that thought which causes her to stumble out of a double axel-triple toe loop combination, which is incredibly irritating but nowhere near the worst mistake she might’ve made, and her closing triple salchow is rock-solid. She wants to pump her fist, but she’s seen far too many videos of athletes who met some awful fate for celebrating too soon to do that. Instead, she just smiles – partly because she needed this and because she can’t _wait_ to check the IceForum thread after this program, and partly because the closing music cut in her program comes from the song that’s playing when _Love Exclusive_ closes on Chaerin and Taewoo’s final kiss in the falling snow. She’s beaming when it ends, and not just because that scene is the absolute peak of human achievement. She’s beaming when she meets Kyoshi at the boards and receives scores high enough to put her into first with two skaters remaining.

She knows that today was pure luck and she can’t count on things to look up from here, but it’s hard not to take a moment that might not come again for what it is.

**

**_Gala_ **

**_Four Continents Figure Skating Championships_ **

**_Taipei, Taiwan_ **

“’I’ve often been told that I’m not making returns on the investments being made in me. It’s evident that I have absolutely no choice but to succeed.’”

Azula flinches at her father’s icy voice on the other end of the phone line. She remembers those lines – they’re some of the ones she was most proud of in her interview with Xinyi, a cry for help that hardly feels like one to the outside viewer – too clearly not to know exactly why they’ve angered her father so much. “Meaning…?”

“You said that,” Ozai Nishimura says icily, “to a reporter for a website with tens of thousands of monthly views.”

“Because it was true,” Azula says evenly, though the skaters who pass her by backstage as she waits to perform in the exhibition gala can all tell that evenness is the last thing she feels. “And it shouldn’t be a problem considering that I didn’t name or implicate you in any way.”

“Anyone who did more than five seconds of digging would see that I own half of the companies that sponsor you!” Ozai shouts. She holds the phone away from her ear, a tactic she’s learned to mitigate the unpleasantness of these all-too-frequent rant-calls from her father, one that’s instinctive by now after so many of them. “What is the press going to say about this?”

_Nothing that isn’t true._ Azula’s too smart to say it, but it’s hard not to think it. “They probably won’t even mention you.”

Another lesson Azula’s learned: no one cares enough to be as outraged by her father’s iron-fisted control over the one of his children he still holds some sway over as he thinks they’re going to be.

“Tell that blog to take it down and issue a statement about the inaccuracy of their reporting.”

It’s not a suggestion. Azula clenches her fist. “Fine,” she says coldly.

She can’t be sure what she risks if she doesn’t obey, but she already knows she isn’t going to. The thought echoes as she watches the rest of the skaters' exhibition programs on a backstage television.

Aang and Toph (a narrow second place in pairs) are going for comedy as they usually do, but their program - which appears to be about a stereotypical vampire and a teenage girl who simply isn't having it with any of his young-adult-fiction-protagonist tricks - doesn't make her laugh. Ty Lee (third place) hasn't looked as happy on the ice in years as she does while she's working the crowd to Blackpink in a leather catsuit that's far more Azula's style than it is her own, which would normally annoy her if she weren't so distracted. Suki, who's had a shaky week here, looks a little dejected but still smiles through her gala program to a song in Mandarin that she's probably chosen exclusively to pander to the crowd (which does, indeed, enjoy it). Mai can only be described as smug, wearing a crop top, a baggy jacket, and jeggings as if she's running to the grocery store and not performing, and skating to an American song that Azula wishes wasn't so egregiously overplayed. Kuvira and Bolin still look like they want to murder each other. She can't watch the ice dance teams without feeling a twinge of regret that Zuko isn't here because he might just be the only person in the world who'd get why she's so out-of-sorts. 

None of it distracts her, and she's forced to ask a question she almost never asks. 

_What am I going to do?_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Bonus points if you know where I got the names Xinyi and Chaerin, though I doubt many people will unless you're obscenely familiar with the Hinaverse (I'm calling it that because really, that's the main difference between canon and the TWG AU). :P


End file.
